O'Neill's Royal camogs earn hard fought win over Armagh

Meath Camogie secured a victory in their first game of 2025 against Armagh on Saturday in Dunganny.

Meath 2-11

Armagh 0-7

Tom Gannon

Anton O'Neill began his tenure in charge of Meath with a hard-fought win over newly promoted Armagh on Saturday afternoon in the opening round of the Div 2A Camogie National League at Dunganny.

The scoreline suggests that this contest was relatively straightforward for the Royals but that was far from the truth. In what transpired to be a very physical encounter, O'Neill will be relieved that his side managed to pull away from the northern outfit in the final 10 minutes.

Two second-half goals courtesy of Maeve Clince and Isabel O'Connor secured Meath breathing space between themselves and their opposition on the scoreboard.

O'Neill's positional tactics on the day proved to be vital. Grace Coleman and Maeve Clince were both lined out in unfamiliar numbers, Coleman at full-back and Clince at full-forward. However, the two stalwarts were up to the task at hand and they both did extremely well.

Amy Gaffney was initially lined out at wing-back and the decision to push her up to midfield at half-time was key as the Ratoath woman made several unstoppable line-breaking runs.

Isabel O'Connor had a huge influence off the bench and secured 1-2 for herself. O'Connor was the top scorer on a day that Meath secured points from 10 different sources.

After a sluggish start to the clash, Aoife Carey got the scoring underway in the 10th minute, before Emma Regan and Ella O'Brien gave the Royals a three-point head start.

Sinead Quinn kicked off Armagh's tally and that score was quickly followed by a free from Rachal Merry to leave one point between the sides.

Merry's successful deadball, turned out to be Armagh's final score for the half and points from Maeve Clince and Aoibhin Lally sent the Royals in at the break ahead on a scoreline of 0-5 to 0-2.

Meath had struggled to find their rhythm in the opening 30 minutes, but they responded well and returned to action with intent. Ciara Foley opened the scoring in the second-half before she provided a good ball into Clince who capitalised on the Armagh netminders' slow reactions, and finished to the back of the net which put Meath seven points to the good.

The resulting puck-out led to a well-worked score for the Royals as captain Leah Devine teamed up with Aedin Slattery before Gaffney polished off the move with a nice point.

Armagh were not dead and buried yet though and the powerful Quinn opened their second-half account. Merry and Meath sub, Isabel O'Connor traded points which left seven between the sides.

Armagh then had their brightest patch of the encounter as they rattled off three points in succession courtesy of two frees from Merry and one from Niamh Forker.

As we entered the final 10 minutes of the contest, Meath's advantage had been reduced back to four. A Grace Connolly point settled the ship for the Royals with seven minutes remaining.

In the 58th minute, a good ball from Amy Gaffney found the palm of Ciara Foley who then turned and struck in the direction of the Armagh net. Foley's shot was blocked but after a scramble in the square, O'Connor managed to bundle the sliotar over the line.

Meath finished out the contest with two injury-time scores from Slattery and O'Connor. A good start to Anton O'Neill's tenure in charge but there is still a bit of improvement needed if Meath are going to be contenders for the Intermediate Camogie championship this year.

Meath - Tara Murphy; Laura O'Neill, Grace Coleman, Sophia Payne; Rachel O'Neill, Leah Devine, Amy Gaffney (0-1); Erin Leddy, Aedin Slattery (0-1); Emma Regan (0-1), Aoibhin Lally(0-1), Aoife Carey (0-1, one free); Ciara Foley (0-1, one free), Maeve Clince (1-1), Ella O'Brien (0-1). Subs - Isabel O'Connor (1-2) for O'Brien 28m, Grace Connolly for Lally 36m, Katie Connolly (0-1) for Regan 45m, Roisin Heaney for Leddy 53m, Blaithnaid Hughes for Carey 60m.

Armagh - Sarah Connolly; Meabh O'Hare, Grainne McWilliams, Riona Cunningham; Michelle McCone, Gemma McCann, Eimear Hayes; Alannah McEntee, Katie Convie; Ciara Hill, Corinna Doyle, Tierna Maxwell; Megan O'Callaghan, Sinead Quinn (0-2), Rachel Merry (0-4, four frees). Subs - Niamh Forker (0-1) for Convie 39m, Lucie Loughran for Maxwell 45m, Clodagh McClelland for Cunningham 55m, Grace Gaffney for Hayes 60m.

Referee - Karl Collins (Galway)