Young Mayo rugby star features at international level

SHE has made history. Aoife Heaney (17) has become the first rugby player from Claremorris Colts to play for Ireland.

Her club back home in Mayo proudly shared the news of Aoife's first cap calling it 'a fantastic milestone' for her 'and for Claremorris Colts RFC’ when she strode out in green at the recent Six Nations tournament.

“It was an unreal experience. I know it'll translate back when I go play in club rugby and provincial again,” Aoife told The Mayo News after her international sojourn.

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The enormity of the moment, wearing the green jersey for the first time and walking on the pitch, did not go unnoticed by the teenager.

“To be honest, I was very nervous going out there. And they make it very real when you're  running on the pitch and there's a crowd and they are streaming it live online. But some of the girls who had played last year, their nerves are kind of over from their first cap, they helped you through just telling you it's fine.”

Aoife had to put in a lot of hard work and jump through several hoops before getting selected for the actual matches. Of course the back-three player displayed her great skills and rugby talent playing for her club and school. Aoife won the Connacht schools title with Mount St Michael Claremorris.

She featured for Connacht at U-18 level, showing her running skills with ball in hand, breaking the line and offloading in impressive fashion. Aoife has also been nominated for U-18 women's player of the year by Connacht Rugby.

“To make it into the Ireland squad, we all play in our provinces and then they pick a National Training Squad. I trained with them in Galway and then you get to go to a camp and you just get three days up in camp to show how you can play. Before they picked the actual U-18 Ireland training squad, we had two challenge matches, there were two teams and we played each other. After that they announced the training squad.” 

The last step was the announcement for the actual matchday squad, after so much hard work, Aoife and the other players got called into a personal meeting with the coaches. Probably the most daunting part of the whole process.

“There's a separate meeting room and they just call you in one by one in your time slot and you sit in front of two of the coaches and they tell you if you've made it or not.”

Fortunately for Aoife, she was picked and she played in every match at the U-18 Six Nations tournament at full-back and on the wing:

“I prefer full-back, even though wing and full-back are kind of the same, just defensively, it's different. At full-back in offense you can create your own opportunities with the ball. While if you're stuck in the wing, you have to wait for someone to get it out for you to work off.”

It is obviously a transition, especially for young players, to jump from club to provincial rugby and on to the international stage. The skill and physicality levels rise significantly.

“We had a few challenge matches before the Six Nations to give us a bit of exposure to it,” Aoife explains. “So we played England in a challenge before and it did kind of open us up to the fact that it's going to be harder than some of the games we've previously played. We're entering elite level.”

She surely is. Aoife Heaney is hoping to train with the Connacht Senior squad from next season. She would then link up with fellow Mayo talents Clara Barrett from Geesala and Lily Brady from Westport. Another step up for the promising Claremorris talent.

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