Player-Coach Role A ‘Learning Curve’ For Suttonians Star Farrell McCabe

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Suttonians Rugby Football Club is 100 years in existence, and with celebrations all around their centenary season, it is a big year for the club’s teams. The emergence of their Women’s programme over the last decade has proven very successful.

The Sutts Women won the Leinster Division 1 Paul Flood Cup, Division 1 league title, and promotion to the All-Ireland League ahead of the 2019/20 season, and went on to lift the inaugural All-Ireland League Conference trophy in February 2022.

The north county Dublin club have been building over the years to try to crack the top four, and are hopeful of doing that this season. Colin Keogh is their new head coach, assisted by Niall Mahon, with Callum McIntyre in charge of the squad’s strength and conditioning work.

Former captain Farrell McCabe has stepped up as player-coach, and speaking to IrishRugby.ie, she says she is adapting to what the role entails and is excited for what the season has in store.

“It’s definitely been a bit of a learning curve. I suppose it was a whole new restructure for us at the start of the season, and it definitely took a little while for things to kind of gel a little bit more, which is to be expected in any team at any level,” she said.

“Taking on the player-coach role has been really exciting, and it’s kind of something I would love to do in the future. That’s what I’m hoping to do after I stop playing, kind of go into more of a coaching role.

“So it’s really, really interesting to get an insight into it this year. It’s definitely tricky, and it’s been a huge learning curve, but I love the challenge. Having Colin and Niall there, they’ve helped guide me through it. I think it has been really useful.

“I think we’re wanting to take on a lot more as a coaching team, and you can kind of see that coming into effect on the pitch as well. Obviously, Colin wants to bring a style of play that maybe was slightly different to what we were used to.

“I think every team needs that. You need a refresher or kind of a whole new look every once in a while because we can’t go out playing the same style of rugby year in, year out, because we’d be very quickly found out.

“What he’s tried to introduce is brilliant for the team, and he has the girls on board. I think over the last couple of games, we’ve really started to see it click a lot more, which is really exciting.

“So, I’m really excited to see where we can take it, over the next couple of weeks and into after Christmas.”

Before she earned her stripes with Suttonians, Farrell McCabe came up through the ranks at her local club Gorey RFC, initially with the boys teams before joining the girls up to adult level.

The versatile back has always been rugby obsessed since her dad brought her to the field in Gorey as a nine-year-old. That spurred her on to play for her local team and then later join Suttonians, while also turning out for Leinster at underage level and most recently Ulster in the Vodafone Women’s Interprovincial Championship.

“I think I was always rugby mad. When we first moved out to Gorey (from Dublin), my dad brought us straight down to the rugby club. I think I was just gone nine. That was absolutely my first love, but I was always into athletics in school as well.

“I was just always a bit of a sporty kid. I’d always try everything, especially athletics, but then rugby kind of was my main passion so that completely took over.

“Me and (my sister) Kate played a summer of football at one stage, but we quickly found out that wasn’t for us when there was no contact allowed. Rugby has always just been my first, my first love, my biggest passion.

I started off in Gorey, worked my way up through the ranks from Under-10 boys all the way up to the senior Women’s side. Kate’s a bit younger than me, so I did not actually get to play with her in Gorey.

“But when I went to college, it just made more sense to move across to Sutton, especially because they’re playing in a higher league.

“Obviously, I had bigger ambitions as a player to kind of push on a little bit. So the first time me and Kate got to play together was for Suttonians, which was pretty special as well.”

Joining just after Suttonians made the jump up to Division 1 of the Leinster League, Farrell McCabe has become a key member of the team and is known more affectionately as ‘Loz’ to those in Station Road.

Quickly falling in love with the community based nature of the club, in a similar fashion to that of Gorey, she believes that she is part of something special at Suttonians.

With plenty of fond memories in the last couple of seasons, the most notable moment was captaining Suttonians to Conference title success in the 2021/22 season when Ireland Sevens international Kate (pictured below) was also part of the back-line.

“Of course I was!”, she chuckled, when talking about being the catalyst for her sibling to join Suttonians when moving to Dublin for college.

“I joined Suttonians when we had just come up into Division 1 (in Leinster), and we were looking to break into the AIL. And that would have been under Rob Forbes, when he was around, and then we earned promotion into AIL after some really close battles, with the likes of Tullow.

“I think we played Malone a good bit, to kind of try and get into AIL. I’ve been kind of part of Suttonians since the start of our All-Ireland League journey, under Rob Forbes, and then we’ve kind of just worked to build on that.

“Obviously the year we won the Conference final against Galwegians was definitely the highlight for me. That was just unreal. From a personal perspective, to go out and be able to play with Kate, and to win a big final like that was very special.

“I’d love to replicate that but obviously she’s involved with Sevens, so she’s very rarely released. That was a really, really good feeling.

“For our family it was so nice for them to see us play together, especially for my dad because he was the one who got into rugby. That was a really special moment for us both.”

She added: “We had some really solid players, Catherine Martin, Nicole Carroll. It was a really, really good team, and we are happy now that we’ve been able to maintain that kind of top five position.

“Obviously, our ambition is to hopefully crack the top four. But I think it is a testament to us that we have been able to have that consistency in the league for the last number of years, and never luckily been too far down the table.

“I mean personally, it’s been a great club to join. I’m used to kind of the smaller club. It just had that kind of small club feeling even though it is in Dublin.

“A lot of the other Dublin clubs are quite big and I think the family and community vibe in Sutton is something that I love and thrive on. And it just makes everybody a better player at the end of the day when you feel like you’re a part of something special.”

However, ahead of last season, it was a difficult time for the club as with dwindling player numbers, the thoughts of folding became a real possibility. Despite operating with a smaller squad at times, Suttonians battled to a hard-earned fifth place.

A year later they are back looking to go one step further, with healthy numbers thankfully on board. Laura Claridge has joined from New Zealand this year, along with the Dutch international pair of Isa Prins and Esmee Ligtvoet.

Through the tough times last season Suttonians fought all the way for their league points, and Farrell McCabe admits that is everything they pride themselves on at the JJ McDowell Memorial Grounds.

“We might not have the biggest squad, we might not be the largest pack, or we might not be the strongest around the pitch, but what we do pride ourselves on is pure grit and determination.

“However many numbers we have, we’re always gonna show up for each other and battle it out that way. We really like to think that we make it difficult for teams to play against us, and we just show pure determination every time we get on that pitch.

“So, that’s something we’ve prided ourselves on over the last number of seasons. That’s the kind of way we wanted to start this year.

“Obviously, we would have preferred to have a few more wins out of the start of the season. The draw with Ballincollig probably wasn’t the result we wanted, but I suppose weather conditions that day were just something else.

“We were happy to come away with a point ultimately. Our ambition is to be top four and do one better than last season. We’ve kind of put ourselves now in a decent enough position to achieve that this  year.

“Our goal will be, before Christmas, to remain in top four or five and then build on that after Christmas.

“It’s a testament to everyone in the club to go from struggling with numbers to being able to field, and to be able to field competitively now this season, and to hopefully have a name as a team to be kind of reckoned with and not to be underestimated either.”

Suttonians currently occupy sixth place and sit just four points outside of the top four after a hard-earned 24-20 win over Galwegians last weekend. They meet Tullow on Saturday for the first time ever in the All-Ireland League, with the irishrugby+ cameras streaming all the action live from Blackgates.

They are two teams with plenty of past history. Suttonians and Tullow had some big battles in the Leinster League down through the years as the pair fought to achieve that coveted All-Ireland League status.

While Tullow sit bottom of the table and are without a point to date, Farrell McCabe says there is no fear of Suttonians underestimating the Carlow outfit despite coming into the game with their confidence boosted by beating ‘Wegians.

“Last weekend was a tough battle. It was kind of back and forth, and we had started well and then Galwegians got a couple of tries back on us,” explained Suttonians’ top try scorer with five tries across the opening five rounds.

“We actually went down a score in which, usually when we go down a score, we find it quite hard to get back on top. But the girls really dug in, and we were able to pull it out of the bag there towards the end of the game.

“I think there was a few very sore bodies on Sunday morning, it was just so physical. I mean Galwegians are such a physical team and they really really put it up to us.

“I think we were all just glad of the win and to kind of get a little bit back on track, after obviously the Railway result (a 77-10 defeat) wasn’t great at all. We’re happy to take winning momentum into Tullow now this weekend.

Historically, Suttonians and Tullow would have had good battles, all kind of throughout Division 1 in Leinster and when we were working up through the divisions to try and make it to the AIL. Tullow were always one of those teams that we kind of struggled against and had really good battles with.

“So, we are absolutely not underestimating the strength of Tullow. We know that they are a big ball-carrying team, and they look to really put it up to people physically.

“By all means we’re taking this game just as seriously as all the rest of the games we’ve had during the season. Definitely no underestimation on our behalf.”