The list of Irish players to have won a Women’s Champions League medal is not a particularly long one but on Saturday, Republic of Ireland captain Katie McCabe joined that select group as she played her part in the Gunners’ underdog victory over Barcelona in the final.
McCabe featured for all 90 minutes of the 1-0 win in Lisbon, adding the club game’s greatest honour to her achievements at international level such as captaining Ireland to a maiden World Cup appearance and spectacularly scoring the Girls in Green’s only goal at the tournament two years ago.
Watching the Dubliner lift the Champions League trophy was a particularly proud moment for her former Raheny United team-mates, including RTÉ soccer analyst Rachel Graham.
The Shelbourne midfielder had been in action herself earlier on Saturday in a 3pm kick-off against Bohemians in the Avenir Sports All-Island Cup so it meant a rush from Dalymount Park over to the nearest TV in order to see how McCabe was getting on in the European final.
And witnessing the 29-year-old’s moment of glory with Arsenal brought back a flood of fond memories for former Irish international Graham about her former team-mates journey to the top.
“It’s an unbelievable journey and for me, and for us, her older Raheny team-mates, the likes of Pearl (Slattery, Shelbourne captain) and Noelle (Murray), we always kind of see her as still that little kid who, I won’t deny, was a bit of a brat when she was coming through,” said Graham.
“It was a bit like ‘I can do what I like’, and to be fair she backed everything up on the pitch so we kind of let her away with one or two things.
“But we’re unbelievably proud of her and she still has a lot of time for everyone back here. Anytime she’s home, she’s always looking to meet up and we still have our group chat with all our old Raheny team-mates and it was obviously hopping (on Saturday), wishing her the best of luck and congratulations.
“She hasn’t replied to anything yet – I don’t even know if she’s even slept yet – but she definitely will get around to it.
“We’re all so proud of her. What a journey and people do forget sometimes that Katie didn’t have it easy when she first went over to Arsenal.
“She struggled for a while to get to that level and went to Glasgow on loan for a while. So everything she’s got she’s worked very hard for. It hasn’t always come easy for her.
“She’s obviously really naturally talented and gifted but she has worked really hard and even though she was here (in the League of Ireland) and I won’t mind saying a bit of a brat, but she always worked so hard.
“She was a really hard worker in training, hard worker on matches so everything she’s got, she’s really deserved in football.”
McCabe won’t have too much time to revel in Arsenal’s success as the Republic of Ireland return to action with a Women’s Nations League fixture against Turkey on Friday.
Whether she will be available to start or not, time will tell. But Graham is keen to see new call-up Erin Healy get some minutes as well as her own Shelbourne team-mate Aoibheann Clancy, either against Turkey or Tuesday’s match versus Slovenia.
“They’re two players I would love to see. I can’t imagine Carla is going to make a whole load of changes from the last couple of XIs she’s set out,” she said.
“But Katie’s probably the question mark at the moment. She’s obviously going to be fatigued going into that camp. I think she might be meeting up with them Wednesday so not a whole lot of time to adjust to the time zones or the flights, so we’ll see about her on Friday.”
