Offaly girls feature in great Athlone Town Champions League run

FOUR Offaly girls have featured in Athlone Town's great run in the UEFA Womens' Champions League as they came through two qualifiers in recent weeks.

15 year old Tullamore secondary school student, Emma Mooney, Aoife O'Connor from Tullamore, Lucy Fitzgerald, from near the Blueball and Mountbolus and Isabel Ryan from Birr have featured in their big wins in the past week.

Aoife O'Connor, above

A former player with Killeigh Schoolboys/Girls Soccer Club, Mooney became the youngest player to score two goals in her League of Ireland debut a few weeks ago and she came on as a 74^th minute sub in their comprehensive 4-0 win at home to Cardiff City in a sold out Athlone Town Stadium in the first qualifying round last week – Mooney had put a family holiday on home to play in that game.

Emma Mooney, above

Aoife O'Connor and Isabel Ryan both came on in the 79^th minute against Cardiff City. They have both been with Athlone Town for two years and also play for their U19 side.

Athlone Town continued their impressive form on Saturday with a 3-0 win at home to Croatian champions ZNK Agram to qualify for the second qualifying round in a few weeks.

Isabel Ryan, above

Fitzgerald came on as a 78^th minute sub in front of a very excited home crowd. The daughter of a Dublin father and Rath mother, she was a very good underage camogie player with Kilcormac-Killoughey before concentrating on soccer. She played underage soccer with Mucklagh Schoolboys and Girls Club and then went to Athlone Town.

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The second round is being hosted by FC Twente in Enschede in the Netherlands and Athlone Town will face Iceland's Breioablik in the semi-final on August 27 with Twente meeting Red Star Belgrade in the other one. They are the first League of Ireland side to advance to this stage in over a decade.