Ahead of naming her Republic of Ireland squad on Thursday for the Euro 2025 play-off games against Georgia (October 25th and 29th), manager Eileen Gleeson had a mixed bag of news on her players based beyond these shores.
Injury doubts still hang over a number of them, but on a more positive note Izzy Atkinson (Crystal Palace) and Aoife Mannion (Manchester United) made their first Women’s Super League appearances of the season, albeit brief ones, Heather Payne made her first start of the campaign for Everton and Chloe Mustaki returned to Bristol City’s match day squad for the first time since March when she suffered a hip injury.
Katie McCabe might be in a grumpy mood, though, after a horror of a week for Arsenal, one that leaves her manager Jonas Eidevall under no end of pressure. In between dropping five WSL points at home, in a scoreless draw with Everton and a 2-1 defeat by Chelsea, they were throttled 5-2 by Bayern Munich in the Champions League. Not even having provided the assists for both Arsenal goals will, you’d imagine, lighten the Irish captain’s mood.
Speaking of assists: Denise O’Sullivan produced a rather tasty one for Olivia Wingate to equalise in the 100th (!) minute of North Carolina Courage’s game against Angel City on Saturday night. But over at San Diego Wave, Kyra Carusa has been battling a thigh injury that has kept her out of action since June, while Marissa Sheva continues to struggle for game time at Portland Thorns, her 10 minutes off the bench against Orlando Pride on Saturday only her second appearance in eight games.
Back in England, Bunny Shaw banjaxed Niamh Fahey’s 37th birthday by muscling her off the ball to score a 92nd minute winner for Manchester City at Anfield. Leanne Kiernan was largely a spectator when, like Fahey, she came on in the 80th minute, by then Liverpool under siege by the WSL leaders.
In the English Championship, Ruesha Littlejohn and Megan Campbell have still to feature for London City Lionesses, their injuries presumably ruling them out of the Georgia games, while Megan Connolly’s no-show for Lazio in their last two matches could give Gleeson another headache. The Google Translate-assisted “Megan è ferita?” query to the Lazio folk has still to be answered. Happier news from Belgium: Amber Barrett got off the goalscoring mark for Standard Liege on Saturday after an injury-interrupted start to her season
Erin McLaughlin (Portsmouth), Ellen Molloy (Sheffield United) and Jessie Stapleton (on loan at Sunderland from West Ham) are proving to be just about the only bright sparks for their clubs in the Championship after a torrid start to the season, Portsmouth and Sheffield still to pick up a point after six games, and Sunderland collecting just four. But Molloy, who moved to Sheffield from Wexford Youths last month, gave us a reminder of just how gifted she is with her goal in Friday’s 2-1 defeat by league leaders Birmingham. Twinkle toes.
Meanwhile, two Scotland-based players who have been doing their chances of a recall to the Irish squad no harm at all are Celtic’s Saoirse Noonan and Glasgow City’s Emily Whelan.
Since her move from Durham during the summer Noonan has scored 12 goals in 15 appearances, while Whelan got her fifth in four games for City in their draw away to Premier League leaders Rangers on Saturday. Whelan last played for Ireland against Albania a year ago, but Noonan hasn’t been capped at all by Gleeson, her fourth and last appearance coming under Vera Pauw in a friendly before the 2023 World Cup.
Back home, did Stephanie Zambra mark her final game before retirement with a goal? Of course she did.
