Aileen Donnelly has a key role for Kilmessan

Kilmessan's Aileen Donnelly will be looking to add to her already impressive haul of honours when she lines up against Clanmaurice in Sunday's All-Ireland camogie final showdown. 

With 15 Meath senior camogie and three Leinster medals in her collection she can claim to be already one of the most decorated players in the game in Royal County - ever. 

Added to that is the All-Ireland Junior honour she won with Kilmessan in 2014. This year she achieved the remarkable feat of helping her club to BOTH senior and junior titles. 

Now she's seeking to help Kilmessan claim another All-Ireland crown having played a significant role in getting them there. In the semi-final trouncing of Crosserlough Donnelly's accuracy from placed balls helped her rack up eight points with one of her pointed frees a memorable effort from out near the sideline. 

In Kilmessan's Leinster campaign she scored 1-10 in the 6-24 to 1-3 semi-final win over Leixlip and 1-5 in the 2-7 to 1-9 defeat of Raharney in the final. She also took the player of the match award. 

Donnelly - who helped Meath to an All-Ireland Premier Junior crown in 2012 the same year she won a Soaring Star accolade - says Kilmessan had to endure considerable disappointment before that first club All-Ireland was landed three years ago when they defeated Roscommon side Four Roads in the final. She feels the lesson learned from that campaign can help her and her colleagues get over the challenge posed by Clanmaurice. 

"We had played Four Roads in our first All-Ireland semi-final in 2010 and they just completely dominated us physically, they just literally pushed us off the field. I would call them dirty but they really out-muscled us. It was our first taste of a really physical battle," she says. 

"This was the first time we had come up against anything like that. We had beaten Celbridge in a cracker of a Leinster final, they held us for the first 20 minutes, I remember we really pulled away in the second-half of that game. We went out to play Four Roads and we thought, Roscommon camogie we should be on par with them but we weren't ready for them at all." 

The lessons learned from that experience, particularly the need for a greater physicality, were taken on board and Kilmessan were ready for Four Roads when they met them again in the 2014 final on a sodden pitch at Edenderry. 

Donnelly says playing Clanmaurice for the first time is a "refreshing" challenge and Kilmessan have nothing to fear except fear itself. "That's one thing our manager John (Watters) has instilled in us, just worry about our own game and if we play to our own high standards we should come out on top." Sunday's game should reveal the wisdom of that approach once more.