Shelbourne women took Irish womens soccer by storm this year.
The Dublin based side have won the Women’s National League for the second year in a row and also reclaimed the cup title from a sad looking Wexford Youths side who found no glory this year.
The fifth minute into Evoke’s FA Cup Final against Athlone Town FC saw the first goal of the game. Jessie Stappelton stepped up with young but broad and poised shoulders to take the long range free kick. The ball was struck with such pace and power. Both the force of the ball and the battling players in the box proved too much for the Athlone Town goalkeeper, the ball ended up over the white line still grasped in her arms.
Seventeen minutes later a corner was whipped into the box from the left of Athlone’s posts. Shell’s captain Pearl Slattery attacked the ball with aggression, firing it with her head past the defenders and goalkeeper and straight into the back of the net. This built Shell’s confidence and drove them on to dominate the remaining 30 minutes of the half.
Athlone stayed relatively quiet throughout the first half only creating one or two chances giving them a number of things to reflect on in the dressing rooms at half-time.
As expected Athlone came out all guns blazing for the second half to give it everything they had. Róisín Molloy, Athlone Town winger had a great game and created some promising attacks in the second half. Scarlet Herran was thought to have scored one to re-establish the Athlone side, however was quickly called off-side. Various Athlone players edged closer and closer the deeper into the second half it got however unfortunately for Athlone no goal was found.
When the final whistle was finally blown in the ninety sixth minute, a sea of red erupted from the sidelines. The fiery players dressed head to toe in red and white were ecstatic to bring home the league title for the second year in a row and finally bring the cup home for the first time since 2016.
In a post match interview Jessie Stapelton, Evoke’s Cup Player Of the Match credited all of the team’s success to their beloved club and showed her support to the men’s side, who unfortunately didn’t see much luck in their final the following weekend. Despite the men’s loss, the club saw huge success in the 2021/22 season . The women have well and truly earned their accomplishments for the year and hope to do more damage in The Champions League in the coming months.
Caoimhe Woods
Image Credit : womensSoccerphotos