Carla Rowe is in Croke Park to talk about Dublin and Meath and All-Ireland finals and revenge for 2021 and all of that. But mostly she finds herself talking about back-heels. That back-heel.
Dublin led 1-13 to 0-14 in extra-time of their All-Ireland semi-final against Galway two weeks ago when Hannah Tyrrell won a dropping ball inside the 20-metre line and immediately offloaded to the incoming Orlagh Nolan.
But just as Nolan tried to get her shot off, she was surrounded by maroon jerseys and the ball squirted out, ricocheted off a Galway defender and bounced across the face of the goal.
Rowe was unmarked but ahead of the play, so standing on the edge of the small parallelogram she improvised, turned her back to goal and flicked the heel of her right boot at the ball. Goal.
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It has led to several online memes and viral videos, and even a clever Carla Rowe-naldo moniker.
“I knew this was going to come up,” she says when asked about the goal. “I can say it was definitely not a training ground move.
“Look, I suppose a little bit of instinct kicked in there, the ball rolled behind me and I was going ahead of it so I knew if I picked it up the goalkeeper would be there.
“When I look back at it I’m like, ‘Yeah, it was the right thing to do’, but there was that moment when I was running back out thinking, ‘Oh my God, why did I just do that? If it went wrong, I was in trouble.’”
One of the first players over to congratulate (or berate) her for showing such audacity was Nolan, a former Republic of Ireland international at underage.
“She came over and was pushing me, laughing and kind of saying, ‘What were you at?’”
The following day Rowe was recovering from Dublin’s extra-time win when one of her team-mates sent on a screenshot from X.
“I was trending number one in Ireland ahead of Rashford and Coldplay,” laughs the Dublin captain. “These things happen in sport occasionally and I always think you just have to take them in and enjoy them. They don’t happen too often.”
Dublin versus Meath All-Ireland senior football finals don’t happen too often either. In fact, Sunday’s decider between the Leinster neighbours will only be the second time the counties have contested a Brendan Martin Cup showdown.
Meath caused one of the biggest shocks in women’s football in 2021 by beating the then five-in-a-row chasing Dubs.
“2021 is obviously a hard one to take considering there was so much going on,” recalls Rowe.
“But you have to forget about that, years have passed and Meath are a completely different team, as are we. Even from our games this year, we’ve played them three times but we know they’re going to be a different team on Sunday.”
The 2021 result remains something of an outlier because Dublin have largely had the upper hand on Meath ever since.
Dublin have won all three of the clashes between the sides so far this season; 2-19 to 0-9 in the league; 2-10 to 1-6 in the group stages of the Leinster SFC; 2-13 to 0-12 in the provincial final.
“It’s All-Ireland final day, teams come with completely different energies and we know Meath have been building really nicely this year. We know we need to prepare really well for Sunday,” cautions Rowe.
But if Rowe’s back-heel has been gaining all the traction over the last fortnight, it was Tyrrell’s wonderfully hit free in the dying seconds that saved the day for Dublin against Galway.
Dublin were staring at elimination and trailing by a point when they were given one final chance of survival with a free just on the edge of the large arc. It was stick or twist time.
Tyrrell shouldered the burden, grabbed the ball, eyed the posts, took a deep breath and with 12 seconds remaining she curled the ball towards the Galway goal. It quite literally dropped over the black spot. Extra-time.
“Hannah is in great form and I just keep thinking of the point she scored to level the Galway game, that’s just her,” says Rowe.
“That is just ice-cold blood in her veins. To be able to actually kick that free in that moment, it’s a huge moment. As a team-mate, I’m delighted she’s on our side.
“Coming home from the Galway game was a funny feeling, we’d obviously won but we all knew we were disappointed in that game.
“Still, knowing that we managed to get through it, whether it was pretty or not, we had got through it together.”
