Ladies Football Club in Offaly honours long serving stalwart

ST Rynagh’s ladies football club paid a moving tribute to one of their own, Eddie Higgins, on Sunday last. Eddie, who has retired from the club, was one of the founding members back in 1998 along with Mary Kelly and Marie Devery, both who retired some years ago.

There was certainly no doubt about what the players and his fellow club members thought about him as emotional tributes were played out in front of a great crowd from the local community who filed into the GAA clubhouse in Cloghan giving him a standing ovation as he walked into the hall accompanied by his wife Nora.

Eddie coached for fifty plus years, starting with the men before turning his attentions to the ladies club, chairman Oliver Flynn pointed out. Oliver mentioned all the great success that Eddie has had with competitions at all level from seniors down.

The chairman mentioned that Eddie never had to be asked to do anything because he had it done anyhow, how Eddie would pack up his car with players going to training and matches and he referred to all the messages of good will that were played on screen for the occasion.

Linda Sullivan was very emotional as she spoke of how the players called Eddie “Daddy” and Mary Kelly “Mammy”, liking the group to a family as she reminisced about the past and said “they were savage times that we had, the dynamic duo who we all loved and grew up playing for. He was a coach, father figure and when I was older, a friend, someone who I could talk to or ask for advice from and he never doubted our ability as players,” she said.

Linda referred to all she won with Eddie and Mary down through the years and said she was lucky to have them in her life.

All of the players that couldn’t attend the function sent good wishes to Eddie, which were loaded with several great different memories from the past, mostly funny incidents or simply how the passion of their coach helped the team to “drive on” and all wished him well going forward.

His fellow club helper Mary Kelly said they both were a long time with the ladies. She took the crowd down a humorous memory lane including a Feile final in Cavan, which brought plenty of laughter. “We were like a family doing everything together, even devilment, and my memories are of every county final, every match, everything we won and everything the girls put in, they were unbelievable and a lot of Offaly teams hated us, hated me in particular,” said Mary to loads of laughter.

She went on to say that Eddie played a major part in all the success, and like herself, he would miss the girls, the craic, the bit of a chat and she wished him well.

Eddie's wife Nora thanked everyone who made the day special and a lovely occasion for them, especially the lovely refreshments, and organising the event. “Ollie and Arrianna have done trojan work organising this event for us here today and the presentations will bring us many happy memories,” she said.