A 4AM WAKE-up call on a rainy Thursday morning in Dublin.
First stop, London Stansted, and then onwards to Norwich for Ireland’s penultimate Euro 2025 group qualifier against reigning champions England.
As your bleary-eyed reporter waits to board her red-eye flight, she spots a sign.
Rue’s number one fan, it appears to read, and is tucked carefully under a young girl’s arm. The Ruesha Littlejohn supporter is draped in Ireland women’s gear, shorts included, despite the miserable Irish summer.
This is what it’s all about.
Just before 8am, Stansted brings the first reminder of England’s Euro 2024 semi-final win over Netherlands last night.
A pair of gentlemen in Three Lions jerseys roaring that they ‘need a piss’.
Good morning, London.
Is it Coming Home?
It isn’t even half past eight when two more boyos crack open cans on the train as it weaves through the English countryside.
An hour or so to Ely, followed by the second leg to Norwich after some brief confusion and panic.
It’s nearing 10.30am as we arrive at our destination; the bright lights of Carrow Road visible as the train chugs into the station.
While we scan our tickets, there are young women in dresses, presumably heading to horse-racing, drinking tins of gin. We opt for a little more sustenance before making our way to the home of the Canaries.
England boss Sarina Wiegman and Norfolk native Lauren Hemp had already faced the media, with last night’s dramatic 2-1 win over Wiegman’s native land mentioned on several occasions.
Then it was the turn of Ireland manager-player duo Eileen Gleeson and Aoife Mannion. They addressed the FAI abuse allegations and a “dark week” for Irish football in detail, before tomorrow’s game came into focus.
Ireland are targetting their first points – and goals – of the campaign after four defeats in the Group of Death. They are in direct competition with Poland for the final seeded play-off spot, while their hosts are vying for direct qualification along with France and Sweden.
“The group is red-hot,” Gleeson says. “We need to do our best to get a seeded place. This is a must-win game [for England], we’re expecting them to be aggressively trying to take three points.
“We always have to think we have a chance, otherwise we might not show up. We are not going to come to roll over, we will approach it is in the way that is the best for us and gives us the best chance.
“We’re always coming to win. It might not look like how England are trying to win, with their different squads and different methods. But nobody can ever say the girls are not trying to compete. That’s the heart and soul of this team.”
Mannion added: “We need to be seeded, we want to get to the Euros next year. That is what we are going to step over the line to try and do, be as front-footed as possible, as aggressive as we can, as entertaining as we can.”
We sink our teeth deeper into the football in tomorrow morning’s match preview, but one nice human interest story is the return of Julie-Ann Russell to the squad.
The 33-year-old Galway United star is involved for the first time since March 2020. Since then, she has moved home from her semi-professional career in Australia, got married, built a house and had a baby; one-year-old Rosie who has been in Ireland’s Castleknock base this week.
“We have a camp baby now,” Gleeson enthused. “She’s not here but she’s coming back to Cork.
“Obviously it is a dark week but we see the progression in terms of this is a female environment. And for us to support female athletes, motherhood is obviously a natural phenomenon and we want to support that.”
“Julie-Ann is a young mother, Rosie is one now and we love her, she is our camp baby. It is representative of the progression, the acknowledgment of a female environment and that there are differences between the male and the female environments. We promote that and the girls love it. There are 26 babysitters on hand. It brings a nice addition and feeling around the camp.”
Russell is “a bit shook” to be back in the fold after a whirlwind few years, but feels “fitter and stronger for having Rosie”. And it shows, as performance coach Ivi Casagrande puts the squad through their paces at the start of training.
There are cobwebs on some of the seats at Carrow Road — which is sold out for tomorrow’s game — but none on the Ireland players despite most of them being out of season.
Denise O’Sullivan, who is being linked with a move to Manchester United, is leading the charge as she prepares to captain the team in Katie McCabe’s absence. The skipper is in full flight nearby, but is suspended after picking up two yellow cards.
Louise Quinn and Leanne Kiernan share a laugh as they move through the gears. Diane Caldwell claps in encouragement, fresh off receiving her Uefa A Licence qualification. Eva Mangan fronts her group, and doesn’t look out of place in just her second camp.
Littlejohn, meanwhile, is a notable absentee. She follows a tailored programme as she manages persistent Achilles issues, and generally doesn’t train fully on the eve of a game, but it was concerning to see what looked like an ice-pack on her shoulder as she was surrounded by medical staff in the dugout.
Thankfully, for Rue’s number one fan, it appears precautionary and there are no major injury concerns.
A roundabout taxi journey to our accommodation brought us along the River Wensum and around Alan Partridge Land. While there’s more exploring to do when the rain clears up, there was plenty of football chat with the driver.
Great win last night. Incredible goals. But Spain will win it out.
Soft penalty. Game is gone… Southgate is too, no matter what happens next.
But Spain will win on Sunday.
Definitive from David.
What about tomorrow first?
Euro 2025 qualification is secondary to most here, but any Ireland-England game is indeed a big one.
- Ireland v England, Euro 2025 qualifier, Carrow Road — KO 8pm, RTÉ and ITV
