SPORTSWOMAN OF THE YEAR: After an extraordinary year for Cork sport it was probably inevitable that the last award for 2005 went to Briege Corkery. Not that she suspected it.
That look of genuine surprise was evident in Dublin's Conrad Hotel yesterday when Corkery was named The Irish Times/Mitsubishi Electric Sportswoman of the Year.
It was a moment that reflected her obvious modesty, and also the standard of the other monthly award winners vying for the overall prize. But winning All-Ireland camogie and football titles with Cork within a fortnight was always going to be hard to beat, and so the judging panel plumped for Corkery.
Whoever said it was a low-key year for Irish sport obviously wasn't paying attention to what the women were doing. By the time the 11 monthly winners were presented at the award ceremony in Dublin yesterday the tension was reminiscent of a certain other ceremony involving golden statuettes. Any one of them could win it, and none of them had a clue as to who it would be.
As Minister Mary Hanafin opened the envelope the guessing was still going on. Yet when Corkery's name was announced there was no arguing. Four other dual players shared in Cork's memorable double, but she'd done it at the age of 18, and her move from defence into midfield in the camogie final ultimately sealed Cork's victory.
"I'm totally surprised to win," she said, clearly meaning it. "I'm practically speechless right now. Of course it's a very proud moment but it will definitely take some time to sink in. I was just delighted to be involved with all the other competition there.
"But I'm really only accepting this on behalf of Cork camogie and Cork women's football. Without the fantastic players around me I wouldn't be here at all, so I'd like to thank all the girls again for getting me through the year. We had some great fun and this is a great end to it all."
Corkery turned 19 only last month, and slowly her thoughts are moving towards defending both titles next September. Few get to play two All-Ireland finals in Croke Park, let alone win both within a fortnight, yet her ambitions will no doubt grow after an award like this.
"Definitely," she agreed. "I really didn't know what I wanted to do after finishing school and was thinking about going away for the year. But I decided I had to stick around and hopefully have another great year in 2006.
"And it's been an amazing year for Cork, between the soccer and the hurling and what we did with the camogie and football. It was a very busy year for me, but I enjoyed every bit. I'd be training six nights a week, sometimes seven. But that wouldn't bother me at all, not when I'm having the fun I do. You're really socialising as well as training. You're making friends from all over the county and even all over the country."
Minister Hanafin had earlier praised the "commitment and talent" of all the monthly winners, and there was no arguing with that either. The 10 sports represented in the 2005 ceremony could hardly better illustrate the incredible range of success achieved by Irish women these past 12 months.
With Jessica Kürten (who won two monthly awards) now reaching world-class standards in showing jumping and Madeline Perry doing likewise in squash, there's much to look forward to in 2006. In fact the achievements of many of the monthly winners recognised yesterday would probably have gone unnoticed were it not for these awards, now entering their third year. Katie Taylor's European boxing success, Nicole Morgan's breakthroughs in surfing, and Jolene Byrne's consistency in distance running were all recalled yesterday - and it's highly unlikely we've heard the last of them.
There was one other winner yesterday in the person of Irish Times journalist Grania Willis. Her scaling of the North Side of Everest last May (that's 29,002 feet, by the way) merited a monthly award, but she was ruled out of contention lest the paper be accused of bias. Instead editor Geraldine Kennedy last night presented Willis with a special-achievement award.