Tallaght/Garda Women 32
Tries: Eimear Downey, Samantha Ledden, Laurileigh Baker, Megan O’Callaghan 2, Abbie Thornton
Conversions: Megan O’Callaghan
Dundalk 0
Sunday, 18th October, 2026
Leinster League Division 5
Westmanstown
The Tallaght and Garda women’s teams have joined forces this season to give their members a chance to play senior rugby as both were struggling for numbers. They took on Dundalk in Westmanstown in Division 5 of the Women’s Leinster league.
Tallaght/Garda had a strong start when winger Eimear Downey raced away for a fine try to give the home team a 5-0 lead. Tallaght/Garda then doubled their lead when, after a number of strong carries by the forwards, Samantha Ledden forced her way over from close range. This left the halftime score at 10-0 to Tallaght/Garda.
In the second half Tallaght/Garda continued to dominate and impressive number 8 Laurileigh Baker showed her pace and power to break several tackles on her way to scoring an excellent individual try. Megan O’Callaghan converted to make it 17-0. Shortly afterwards O’Callaghan was on the scoresheet again, this time scoring her first try in senior rugby to make it 22-0.
The tries kept coming for Tallaght/Garda, this time for full back Abbie Thornton who broke through the middle and showed great pace to race away and score to make it 27-0. After scoring her first senior try, Megan O’Callaghan didn’t wait long to score her second. First she kicked ahead and Eimear Downey put in a great chase to force the Dundalk player to the ground. When the ball spilled out the other side of the ruck, O’Callaghan showed great awareness to run around and pick it up and score a simple try to make the final score 32-0 to Tallaght/Garda.
Head coach Amanda Garrett was delighted with how the team performed on their first runout together. “There are things we need to improve like the lineout, but overall that was a really great team performance from a bunch of players who were only learning each other’s names in the warm-up. We were asked to name a player of the match but there was so many contenders, we couldn’t really pick one player. So we’re making the whole squad the player of the match.”
Team manager Lorna Quinn wanted to make a special mention of two players. “Roisin Nic Uileagoid and Karen Mooney were both playing their first games after having babies and they both put in massive shifts today. It was great to be back playing rugby and hopefully other players from both clubs will see this result and maybe think about pulling the boots on again. With a few more players we could really make this a special season.”
Player of the match: The Whole Squad
Tallaght RFC
- Kim Littlefield
- Samantha Ledden
- Laurileigh Baker
- Ellen Kelly
- Roisin Nic Uileagoid
- Megan O’Callaghan
- Lucy Mangan
- Karen Mooney
- Eimear Downey
- Abbie Thornton
- Lorna Quinn
- Martina Fitzpatrick