‘Football is quite literally my life’
The Anglo-Celt Community & Sports Awards, in partnership with Mannok and Kingspan, will take place this evening in the Cavan Crystal Hotel. Ellie Brady is a finalist for Young Sports Star of the Year...
Just coming home from graduation on Friday, there was not much time to celebrate for footballer Ellie Brady: “We have training tonight and all focus is on Sunday’s match.” Of course she was referring to the Senior Ulster Intermediate Final against Down. Winning this final just adds to Ellie's list of achievements. The Ballyhaise native was only called up to the Cavan Senior Panel this year, so the commitment is “far bigger” than it was with the Minor team, which she captained. “You're going hell for leather, but it's paying off,” she says. Cavan Ladies recently won the National Football Division 3 League and their feelers are reaching towards the capitol after Sunday's victory.
Finishing last year's season, the 18-year-old was crowned Young Footballer of the Year in Ulster. She was pivotal to her team’s success, being a constant steady figure around midfield for Cavan minors. She ascribes this to her atletics training, which she had to quit a few years ago with Gaelic training four to five times a week. “Speed is probably my biggest attribute. Without athletics, I don't think I would have been the player I am today, doing what I've done today.” Sport, and football in particular, is a “big part of me”, which is why she is choosing a university course in Sport’s Science and Health to become a Physio or Occupational Therapist starting from September. She has bagged one PPS title with her Loreto College team, narrowly scraping by another one when they lost the recent PPS Senior A final against Skibbereen Community College last March.
“Football is quite literally my life”, she says.
During her young football days, her first goal was to play in Breffni. In 2023, she was able to do so with her club Ballyhaise for the first time. “That was so special.” Since then, the football horizon has broadened: “I think every game we play, Croke Park looks a bit more realistic and less of a dream and more of a possibility.”
With special thanks to our partners and sponsors in these awards - Mannok, Kingspan, Sherry FitzGerald Declan Woods, Cavan Crystal Hotel, Dovida, Kyte Powertech, CICS Silo Clean and Joe Rowley Windows