BY KIERAN McCARTHY
O’DONOVAN ROSSA’S all-conquering ladies football team has won 19 of their last 20 championship matches in their remarkable run from junior A level to the senior ranks.
It’s a stunning stat that highlights how the high-flying Skibbereen team has generated incredible momentum – and made winning a habit – to push them up into the top tier of club football in 2025.
From their opening Cork JAFC group win in 2023, beating Midleton, the Rossas won all 12 championship games last season as they power to county, Munster and All-Ireland titles.
It was the dream season, capped off by their titanic All-Ireland final triumph against Claremorris the week before last Christmas – Éabha O’Donovan was the hero that day, with a decisive late score that swung the final in her team’s favour, similar to what unfolded in Cloughduv in the county intermediate final last weekend.
James O’Donovan’s team had been knocking on the door of county junior glory before last season, having lost the 2022 Cork final to Naomh Abán, but there was an expectation they would need time to find their feet at intermediate level this season.
‘This is a big challenge for the team to up their game again and push on,’ O’Donovan told the Star after Skibb’s first-ever intermediate championship game when they beat Inch Rovers 2-10 to 1-9.
‘We haven’t really set ourselves a target,’ the Rossas boss added at the time, ‘I know this is a cliche but we want to take it game by game and see how we get on.’
As the Skibb team jumped the next two hurdles, beating Donoughmore (5-19 to 1-6) and Naomh Abán (1-9 to 0-11), they had a 100 percent record after three rounds, and were on course for a top-four finish and a semi-final spot. Then, on September 8th last, came their first championship defeat since the Cork junior A final loss to Naomh Abán on October 1st, 2022 – Valley Rovers beat the Skibbereen team by a single point, 3-15 to 0-13.
Captain Laura O’Mahony says that was the defining moment in this campaign.
‘That was the turning point for our championship. That is what kickstarted us, the moment we knew we had to pull up our socks if we wanted to do well,’ she said, and the Rossas response was emphatic – they hammered Rosscarbery (2-17 to 0-5) and Abhainn Dalla (6-18 to 0-3) to surge into the semi-finals. There, they exacted their revenge on the one team that has beaten them in a championship game these past two seasons, outclassing Valleys 3-16 to 0-3 to qualify for the county final against the team that beat them in the 2022 Cork junior A decider, Naomh Abán.
The experience gained and lessons learned on this journey has helped Skibb to mature and develop. They don’t panic. There’s an inner-belief in this squad, forged from this adventure. When Naomh Abán went three points up with ten minutes to go, Skibb stuck to their plan. Point by point they reeled the Mid Cork team in, Éabha O’Donovan and Jessica Beechinor the scorers, before O'Donovan, again, kicked the winning score in a final.
It’s impressive how fast Skibb found their feet at intermediate level – having averaged 0-18 per game in 2023, across county, Munster and All-Ireland campaigns, their scoring rate stands at 0-21 per match after their county intermediate campaign. Just as impressive is their defensive effort, they’ve conceded just over 0-8 per game in their eight intermediate matches and have kept four clean sheets. This is a team still developing, and that will now line out at senior level in 2025. Before that, there’s a Munster intermediate campaign, and more adventures to have.
