Antrim camogie

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

TO be fair last years final in Portglenone was one of the best finals ive seen in years.

Big crowd, tight game and a really high skill level from both teams. Our girls have been knocking on the door but Loughgiel wont be willing to open the door anytime soon.

I was at their semi final v St Finbarrs and it was one of the best games of camogie ive ever been too. Had loughgiel not had S'neill or Sarsfields in their way they would potentially of had an all ireland won.

When you seen Athenry in the final you dont see any easy route open to any team.

[Cannon Fodder]

Club Camogie definitely strengthening up with great work going on throughout the county from the City, to the South west and into the traditional Glens teams.

For Antrim to really match the southern counties we needed to broaden our catchment and with the city starting to develop young camogs like Aimee, Maeve Devlin (St Paul's) and Aoife Fitz (LD) the opportunity hopefully will arise.

Cushendall imo still a bit back - there's a big step up from winning underage to playing senior and I'm actually not sure they can bridge that gap. They have some very talented young players but the jury is still out on them.

Ballycastle are long way off the top three and need to cotton on that it's a team game - too many individuals and poor discipline

Dunloy definitely can bridge the gap to Loughgiel and with Eobha they have a special talent in their squad. Have they the depth possibly.

Loughgiel - agreed haven't won much at underage recently but have brought one our two through each season recently to add to their squads. Remember they contested 3 finals last season, Senior, Intermediate and Junior. It will definitely come to an end at some stage.

Ones to watch - Naomh Padraig - developing away with a sprinkling at County underage. If they could keep all their players and get a few returnees they could become a reasonable force and progress up the leagues.

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

St Pauls, Sarsfields & Lamh Dhearg have made decent strides at underage and into adult level this past few years.

If Antrim is to be more competitive it needs more stronger teams pushing up through the grades to senior level. St Pauls have stuck with Intermediate level which is good to see as there's always the temptation to drop back down to whats safer and easier to win.

For too many years clubs in Antrim have yo-yo'd up and down from junior to intermediate or intermediate to senior and then back down. Coaches see the chance to win something and a run of glory for a year as an better option than trying to push on with no trophies.

Its of no use to Antrim to have clubs come up to senior for a year or two and then go back down again to intermediate level. It provides no long term ambition to change the status quo.

For example, in Cork they have 14 teams in the senior championship, Tipp have 10 and Galway have 8.

Antrim had 5 last year and its 6 for 2026. it needs to keep building on those numbers.

[imtommygunn]

How many teams are in division 1?

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

six teams this year in 1A.

Loughgiel
Cushendall
Dunloy
Ballycastle
Ahoghill
Bridini Oga

Last year there was eight teams but Portglenone & Tir Na nOg have dropped to 1B for 2026

1B will have
Tir Na nOg
Portglenone
Cargin
Loughgiel II
Cushendall II

Division 2
Ballycastle II
Creggan
Dunloy II
Rasharkin
Rossa
Sarsfields
St Pauls

[SaffronSports]

St Pauls, Sarsfields & Lamh Dhearg have made decent strides at underage and into adult level this past few years.

If Antrim is to be more competitive it needs more stronger teams pushing up through the grades to senior level. St Pauls have stuck with Intermediate level which is good to see as there's always the temptation to drop back down to whats safer and easier to win.

For too many years clubs in Antrim have yo-yo'd up and down from junior to intermediate or intermediate to senior and then back down. Coaches see the chance to win something and a run of glory for a year as an better option than trying to push on with no trophies.

Its of no use to Antrim to have clubs come up to senior for a year or two and then go back down again to intermediate level. It provides no long term ambition to change the status quo.

For example, in Cork they have 14 teams in the senior championship, Tipp have 10 and Galway have 8.

Antrim had 5 last year and its 6 for 2026. it needs to keep building on those numbers.

I thought they had it right when they had the 8 teams up but split the league after 1st round of games so the bottom teams were only playing the big ones once and probably minus their county players.

Think Carnlough could be added to the list of teams doing well soon. I think in the next few years they will make their way up to Intermediate level at least. The bulk of girls that they started again with at underage will be u19 this year so if they keep progressing and adding a few more each year, they should keep pushing on. Those u19 girls will be going to uni this September so that might hurt them at the start of seasons depending on where the girls go but they're at the age profile now where I would expect them to win Junior soon and then see how they get on at Intermediate. 

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

For sure, Carnlough have done well over the past number of years and have built the club up well.

If they can get themselves the new pitch finished and opened it will give them a solid base for the rest of their days.

Id say a realistic target for the club is to win the Junior championship in the next few years. Its not beyond them to do it.

[bannside]

Great win for camogs, well done to everyone involved.

Unreal coverage recently too on social media...Sean Kellys magic touch starting to pay dividends.

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

Tough game this weekend for the girls with Waterford the visitors. They had a good win at home v Galway so it will take a good performance again.

Roisin joining up again with the panel is a big boost for the team.

Game is set for Ballymena at 1pm i see.

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

tough result for Antrim on Saturday.

I think we had high expectations after the previous rounds result away to Cork and were brought back down again.

Waterford were tactility much better than Antrim and moved the ball about easier.

If anything these games are a good exposure for our players against better teams. We can only improve from this.

The U23 were away to Kilkenny on Sunday for a friendly which again is good for the players.

[whereshegoinref]

Incredibly promising performance against a fairly strong Galway team yesterday. Serious grit and determination to go toe to toe with all ireland champs and could have very easily got the win at the end.
Competitive against waterford until the bench was emptied, if decision making and execution was just tidied up a bit who knows where they would be.
Should be a shoo in for intermediate, and it will be a real shame if they are playing 1B league next year, another year exposed to this opposition could be the making of them.

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

Impressed with the girls against Galway. Serious effort put in and could of got a result from that game.

If anything the exposure to top level camogie can only benefit Antrim in the long run. Playing against the top level teams will bring them on and build the county up again.

Technically we are still behind the top teams in terms of how we move the ball about and work through the lines. You can see that difference in some of the games esp against Tipp & Waterford. But again that can only improve if we take on board what were playing against and work to improve.

An area of concern is the lack of scores coming from the forwards. Nicole has scored half of these herself out of Antrims 48 total. With Roisin coming back into the team it will hopefully see her get up to full speed.

[whereshegoinref]

Another strong show vs Kilkenny, the girls have shown that they can compete at this level, the challenge now is to maintain that intensity in games where they will be undoubtedly favorites in the Intermediate cship.

[Na Glinntí Glasa]

I thought by the way things were going that we were in a position to get a result after the goal but Kilkenny just dropped it a gear to pull away.

They needed to get scores to have a hope of reaching a league final ahead of Galway on scoring difference so def stepped it up a level.

This experience and exposure at this level can only be a good thing for our girls so going forward they can hopefully use it to get them to an All Ireland final in August.

If they can learn the lessons from last year they def can lift that All Ireland

[Cannon Fodder]

Game against Galway showed that we could mix it with the big teams, it took Galway to introduce a couple of seasoned ladies late on to finally see themselves home. We had chances in the first half to stretch out our lead but didn`t take them and in the end it proved costly. An opportunity missed.

Saturdays game was different again, played rightly in places but also showed alot of inexperience in the latter parts when our subs were introduced, 0-08 apiece at half time but never got going in the second half, possibly played too deep.

A real find imo has been Cliona Griffin from Cargin whose strength and pace has hurt all teams she has played against to date.

A good campaign and mixed it with everyone, would have liked to play Tipp again to see where we are really at now.

Now we move to Ulster and the Intermediate championship.