"It has been a huge goal to try and make it, and not just survive"
June 07, 2025
Tipperary's Anna Carey, left, and Angela McGuigan lift the Mary Quinn Memorial Cup following the TG4 All-Ireland Ladies Football Intermediate Championship Final match between Meath and Tipperary at Croke Park in Dublin. © Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile
By Daire Walsh
They have successfully retained their TG4 All-Ireland senior football championship status since sealing a return to the top-tier competition a little under six years ago, but Angela McGuigan and Tipperary are now seeking to push on to another level in 2025.
Despite also representing her native county at minor level in the same season, McGuigan started at full-forward and scored 1-1 when Tipp defeated Meath in a TG4 All-Ireland intermediate football championship final at Croke Park on September 15, 2019. Whereas the Premier women suffered All-Ireland SFC relegation in the wake of winning their previous second-tier title in 2017, they have remained in the Brendan Martin Cup following that memorable 2-16 to 1-14 triumph over the Royal County in GAA HQ.
While remarkable resilience has seen them come through relegation play-off games in 2021, 2023 and 2024, McGuigan and Tipperary are hopeful this year will find them reaching a senior quarter-final for the first time in the modern era. After kick-starting their All-Ireland SFC Group 1 campaign against Galway in Tuam Stadium later on today, the Premier will also face Donegal in a home encounter on June 21.
“We’ve kind of just been surviving the last few years, coming close and not making it. Last year was tough because we drew with Armagh, who obviously won Division One last year and they were in the All-Ireland semi-finals. Losing to Meath by three points as well,” McGuigan said.
“Even though we had probably two of our better games of the year, you’re still facing relegation after that. It’s definitely hard to take. We’re really pushing to try and get into a quarter-final this year.
“It has been a huge goal to try and make it, and not just survive and stay up in senior. You want to try and improve every year. We’ll really be hoping to make a quarter-final.”
With 11 wins from as many games thus far in 2025 between their victorious campaigns in Division 2 of the Lidl National Football League – including an opening round win over the Premier – and the TG4 Connacht Senior Football Championship, Galway come into today’s game against Tipperary as one of the country’s in-form teams.
From Tipp’s perspective, they followed up a third place finish in the same division of the Lidl NFL with consecutive defeats to Waterford and Cork in the TG4 Munster Senior Football Championship.
However, the final round of the latter competition saw Ed Burke’s side playing out a 1-6 apiece draw with current Brendan Martin Cup holders Kerry on May 11 and McGuigan saw this as an ideal confidence booster coming into the All-Ireland series.
“That was huge because I think we weren’t really performing well. We’d lost badly enough to Waterford and Cork in the first two matches, so we really needed something out of the Kerry match and it was a good performance.
“That was huge confidence for us and we’ve really pushed on from that. I think we needed it as well. We needed a bit of a good performance against a top team like them to push us onto championship now against Galway. They play similarly as well, so that helps.”
Originally from the Sliabh na mBan club in Tipperary, McGuigan is arguably one of the most well-travelled Gaelic footballers in Ireland. Having joined the Defence Forces upon leaving school, she found herself doing a cadetship in The Curragh.
This brought her face-to-face with Grainne Kenneally, the former Waterford footballer who kick-started the second chapter of her inter-county career with Kildare in 2020. She had already been lining out at club level with Eadestown by that point and McGuigan went on to join her in their ranks for the 2021 club season.
After amassing 1-3 in their senior football championship final win against Leixlip in the same year, McGuigan registered an outstanding 1-7 as Eadestown retained Kildare's top club crown at the expense of Sarsfields in 2022.
“She was my second in command while I was in cadets. I had a good relationship with her. She was quite scary during cadets, but we became good friends after! She’s also an exceptional footballer as well. She won the intermediate All-Ireland recently with Kildare, she had a great career in Waterford.
“Some other players there, Siobhan O’Sullivan [former Sligo and Kildare footballer]. She’s a commandant as well in the army. A few more there too. There’s a big defence forces origin there, which is great and it’s very welcoming. Grainne was one of our instructors, so it was a good way to get some players in for her, I suppose.”
Although she transferred back to Sliabh na mBan in April 2023, McGuigan is actually set to don the club colours of St Sylvester’s in Dublin this year. As there is an option within the army to spend time in college at a certain point if you don’t have a degree, McGuigan has studied sports science at TU Dublin for the past few years.
She has played O’Connor Cup on a consistent basis with the capital-based college (albeit a fractured fibula kept her sidelined earlier this year) and lined out alongside some notable figures from the inter-county game. One such player was former Dublin star Niamh McEvoy – a five-time Brendan Martin Cup winner during her time with the Jackies.
Along with the likes of Sinead Aherne, Nicole Owens, and Kate Sullivan, McEvoy has long been a stalwart of Sylvester's. While she did take some persuading, McGuigan completed a transfer to the Malahide club at the beginning of April and is looking forward to aiding their cause in this year's Dublin senior championship.
"She [McEvoy] was doing a PhD in TUD and she had ended up playing two of the O’Connor Cup weekends with us. She is obviously an unbelievable footballer, but we got on really well personally as well,” McGuigan added.
“She was always hinting at me joining Sylvester’s and I was kind of fobbing her off, but then this year it’s just a lot of travelling up and down for training. She brought me to lunch one day and she sold it really well. A year of giving it a good go with Sylvester’s. They were obviously in the county final last year and they’ve just serious talent there.”
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