The 2023 FIFA Womens World Cup kicks off in Australia and New Zealand this week and there has never been more public interest in The Republic of Ireland Womens team. For many fans of male football it’s a chance to support the team and learn about our opposition and the favourites for the competition. With that in mind here are the Irish people to follow who will give unique insights about the national team and other teams in the tournament. I will also be providing links to where you can find them on social or traditional media.
You can follow her on Twitter, Instagram or through her contributions to the Off The Ball Programme on Newstalk here
Irish Womens Football all time record caps holder, Emma is a retired Irish international goalkeeper, having represented The Republic of Ireland womens national team for over two decades, obtaining 134 caps in the process. Having played for St Patrick’s Athletic, Arsenal and Brighton and Hove Albion Ladies teams winning no less than 29 trophies in the process, Emma is one of the most respected voices in Irish womens football. Since retiring, Emma has now moved into TV commentary, where she is a co-commentator for Barca TV, FC Barcelona TV channel. In addition, Emma is often seen on Irish media for the likes of Newstalk Radio or RTE TV.
A Sports Writer for the42.ie Gavin qualified from Trinity College Dublin in 2015. Having worked for the likes of The Trinity News and Balls.ie Gavin joined the42.ie in January 2019.
Gavin currently reports on all types of sport but particularly Irish football, both from a local perspective within the LOI but also in an international perspective with the Irish mens and womens football team. Gavin also regularly contributes to The Off The Ball programme in Newstalk, while also hosting and producing a number of podcasts on the42.ie
You see Gavin talking sport on Ireland AM every Monday, you can view his articles for the42.ie here, his Twitter profile here and his contributions to the Off The Ball show here.
The Irish Times Chief Football Correspondent, Gavin is a graduate of UCD before joining The Irish Times in 2003.
Gavin’s extensive knowledge of both the mens and womens international football teams, under age groups, and League of Ireland means that Gavin is one of the most knowledgeable people in Irish football today. He often travels with both the mens and womens squads when they have away fixtures, training camps or tournaments.
Gavin can often be found on the likes of RTE radio or Newstalk. His Irish Times columns can be found here and his Twitter profile can be found here.
Miguel is The Chief Football Writer for The Independent Newspaper in the UK. Through his work Miguel has covered 4 World Cup finals, Champions League finals and has previously covered womens international tournaments as well. He is travelling to the tournament this summer and will mostly cover England’s games, but will be covering any major stories from the tournament too.
You can read his articles on The Independent here and view his Twitter content here.
Emma Duffy is a prominent Irish sports journalist and writer who covers womens and men’s football, GAA and other sports extensively for the sports website The42.ie. Emma is well known for her in-depth analysis, reporting, and insights into the Irish womens national team and womens football in general. Emma has been actively involved in promoting and advocating for the inclusion of womens sport in the media and has interviewed many of The Republic of Ireland’s most well known female sports stars, particularly in football.
You can follow her on Twitter here and view her portfolio of article for The42.ie here
The Deputy Sports Editor of The Guardian, Barry is best known for being the longest serving contributor of The Guardian’s Football Weekly Podcast for the last 17 years. The podcast is the number one football podcast in most podcast charts and the Football Supporters Association Podcast of the year. Barry is also the co-host of the Warm Up show on TalkSport with fellow Football Weekly host Max Rushden.
Barry will be covering the Womens World Cup on Football Weekly and The Warm Up, along with his other co-hosts but his particular focus will be on The Republic of Ireland team.
You can see his Twitter profile here and listen to Football Weekly on Spotify here.
The Irish Independent’s Chief Sports Analysis Writer, David is a journalist for Mediahuis Ireland covering Independent.ie, the Irish Independent, the Sunday Independent and he is an occasional contributor to ‘The Off The Ball Programme’ on Newstalk.
A seasoned sports reporter, Kelly’s knowledge and expertise in both male and female codes is respected throughout the Irish football landscape, as it is in a variety of other sports, including rugby and GAA.
David will be travelling with the team to Australia. You can find his Twitter profile here and his Irish Independent columns here
Mark has been a sports reporter in The Irish Star since 2002, rising through the ranks of the newspaper to become Chief Soccer Correspondent for the newspaper and more recently their subsidiary buzz.ie.
According to his bio on the paper’s website “over seeing the senior men’s and women’s Ireland teams, as well as the underage international sides, the League of Ireland and Irish players abroad”.
Mark will be travelling to the tournament, covering it for The Irish Daily Star. You can see his articles here and his Twitter feed here
The Chief Football Correspondent for The Irish Independent, Daniel is one of the most authoritative voices on League of Ireland football in Ireland today. Daniel covers the Irish Men’s national football team and games involving Irish players playing in England and abroad for the paper. He is the co-host of League of Ireland (LOI) Central Podcast and is often heard contributing to The Off The Ball program about all things Irish football.
Although Daniel is not travelling to the tournament, he has extensively covered the Irish womens football team and other womens international tournaments, such as the womens European Championships.
You can view his Twitter here, his written articles for The Irish Independent here and his contributions to the Off The Ball programme here
Joanne has a disability called Total Amelia (meaning all four of her limbs are missing). You may remember Joanne from 2011 when she then aged 15 who held the then Taoiseach Enda Kenny to account for promising her that the government would not cut disability payments. After the election the payments were cut and Joanne led the campaign for the government to reverse the decision, which they did. As she says on her website “Joanne O’ Riordan has since gone on to speak at the Girls in ICT Unit at the United Nations in
New York, just days after her 16th birthday, in 2012. Joanne was honoured with a Young Person of the Year Award in 2012 and only over 3 years later, was honoured with a JCI Top Outstanding Young Person of the World Award.” Her brother’s award-winning documentary was launched in 2014 and is entitled No Limbs No Limits. The documentary has captured audiences around the globe and has been seen by over 15 million people worldwide.
A recent graduate in criminology from UCC Joanne has now increased her media presence. Creating The Joanne O’Riordan Podcast, interviewing some of The Republic of Ireland’s biggest game changers, holding in-depth conversations about their careers.currently writes a sports column every Thursday in The Irish Times and the self confessed sports addict is passionate about women’s sports and promoting participation within sports in The Republic of Ireland
You can view Joanne’s Twitter page here and her Irish Times articles here.
Emma Duffy interviewed Sarah for the42.ie in 2017. A brief synopsis of the interview states that Sarah is a native of Cork City, Sarah was an All Ireland winner for the Cork Camogie team, while captaining Ireland at underage football Sarah played for Cork City FC, Sarah played against the likes of Stephanie Roche in the newly formed Womens National League. Juggling both sports and college at the same time. Sarah also worked for the likes of the Irish Examiner for six years covering a range of sports, before moving to Dublin in 2014 and switching allegiances to Dublin Camogie. Sarah now works for A+L Goodbody as Company Secretarial Advisor for Asset Management and Investment Funds
Sarah also contributes to the Off The Ball Programme on NewsTalk.They will be extensively discussing the Womens World Cup while it takes place. You can view her Twitter profile here
Eoin McDevitt, Ciaran Murphy, Ken Early, Simon Hick and Mark Horgan are founding members of the Second Captains Podcast, Ireland’s number one sports podcast. They report on all sports, but this summer they will particularly be focusing on the Women’s World Cup.
They started working on the Off The Ball programme in Newstalk in 2004. In 2013 they left to create Second Captains ltd, a production company doing daily sports podcasts covering all aspects of Irish
and international sport. The company now has over 13,500 monthly subscribers on Patreon and 120,000 weekly listeners to their free to air Monday shows.
They do RTE radio shows, investigative series with the BBC, live-show events in Ireland, the UK and US and sell Second Captains merchandise on their website. Ciaran and Ken both have weekly Irish Times Sports columns. Ken is their football correspondent and was due to travel to Australia covering the Irish women’s football team, however a last minute injury has prevented him from doing so. He will still be following the team from home.
You can view their website at secondcaptains.com. Ken’s Irish Times articles can be accessed here, or there Twitter feed is here.
The Women’s National League podcast from FinalWhistle.ie is enjoying its third season covering both the domestic and international games it boasts decades of knowledge of the game between the two hosts.
A veteran of two World University Games as an administrator, coaching St. Francis in the UEFA Women’s Champions League and reaching National Cup Finals at Senior, Underage and Universities level with both UCD and St. Francis. Breifne Earley has been involved with teams featuring no less than five of Ireland’s World Cup squad during their youth and collegiate days.
Co-host Aaron Clarke has also been covering the domestic game since the early days of the National League with the @TheWNLShow social accounts.
The platform regularly features both international and national league players, coaches and personalities as well as reports, statistics and information on all major women’s leagues around the world.
The normal weekly video and audio podcast is the only regular weekly show consistently covering the women’s game in Ireland but the schedule will be increased for the duration of the World Cup.
Podcast: https://www.finalwhistle.ie/womensnationalleague/
World Cup Coverage: (Squads, Stats, Match Reports, Player Profiles)
Women’s World Cup 2023