Costigan: Faith Has A Huge Future Ahead Of Her

Oviawe made her first start of the current Celtic Challenge campaign and was immediately front and centre, romping clear from the halfway line to touch down after just 51 seconds. She added a second try – her team’s 16th in all – during the final minute.

Deservedly picked out as the player-of-the-match, the 22-year-old started the game at openside flanker and ended it in the second row, showing the pace, physicality, and versatility that have made her a big hit in the colours of Railway Union and Connacht.

She furthered her international aspirations in 2024 as one of the Under-23 players permitted to be involved in the inaugural Six Nations Women’s Summer Series with the Ireland Under-20s. She made two appearances at blindside flanker.

Her efforts with Connacht during the Vodafone Women’s Interprovincial Championship then earned her a first call-up to the Ireland Women’s senior squad as a training panellist, meaning she is very much on the national coaches’ radar.

If she can keep delivering performances like last Saturday’s one, the only way is up for Oviawe. Amee-Leigh Costigan, who captained the Clovers against Brython Thunder, spoke afterwards about the Athlone youngster’s potential.

“Faith is absolutely brilliant,” said Costigan, who ran in two tries herself from the right wing. “She’s coming up through the ranks now at the moment, and has a huge future ahead of her.

“Seeing her out there today absolutely killing it, she was breaking with so many carries. She’s so fast as well, she has it all.

“A good strong fend, and she’s a really good girl at the end of the day. She’s hard working, and loves her rugby like us all.”

Oviawe’s previous three appearances in this season’s Celtic Challenge were as a second row replacement, so she made the most of her inclusion in the starting XV at Parc y Scarlets where she racked up some impressive individual numbers.

She covered 125.2 metres with her 15 carries, including 109.7 post-contact metres, and was credited with four linebreaks and five defenders beaten. She also made three tackles and had one lineout take.

While the Clovers continue to breath down the necks of their Irish rivals, the Wolfhounds, in the Celtic Challenge title run-in, the clash with bottom side Brython Thunder saw head coach Denis Fogarty make a number of personnel changes.

Oviawe was part of a particularly young starting pack, which was bookended by two teenagers in Grainne Burke (19) and Jemima Adams Verling (18), and had an average age of just 20.6.

Fogarty said the changes were ‘more so to freshen things up and make sure that the players that have been training all this time get an opportunity as well, and that they keep driving that standard that’s already set throughout the season’.

A total of 16 Clovers players were included in Scott Bemand’s 40-strong Ireland squad ahead of the Guinness Women’s Six Nations. Nine of their forwards made the cut on the back of the team’s consistently strong form in the Celtic Challenge.

“It’s probably player-led, they’re just driving standards,” Fogarty said of their winning run which now stretches to six games. “I suppose leading up into Six Nations selection and stuff like that, there was a big drive for that for the players.

For us as coaches, it was just ensuring that we give them a platform to perform on. There were 16 girls that got selected (for Ireland camp), which is really pleasing.

“It’s been brilliant. That’s the most pleasing thing, and that’s the whole idea of this competition for us. Making sure that we were allowing players put their hand up for selection for Six Nations.

“I think the most important thing is we keep driving that standard now for the last remaining rounds. It’s keeping on point, don’t get comfortable.”

With the Six Nations fast approaching, Ireland dual star Costigan has enjoyed getting a run of 15s matches under her belt. She has captained the Clovers on three occasions, in the absence of fellow international Enya Breen, and scored seven tries in six outings.

Reflecting on their sixth successive bonus point victory, she said: “I thought it went really well. We have quite a young group with us over here. To see them flourish out there was absolutely amazing.

“Our senior players also stepped up there today. They really got us good front-foot ball, and bossed us around and got us into our rhythm which was really good.

“We know how good a side Brython Thunder are. They got their purple patch and we had to weather that out.”

For the second round running, Costigan scored from an inch perfect kick. Two weeks back in Cork, it was Breen threading a kick through into the Glasgow Warriors 22 for the Tipperary speedster to collect and dot down ahead of the chasing defenders.

This time, during a dominant Clovers display in west Wales, Nicole Fowley used a penalty advantage to hang up an inviting cross-field kick, and the experienced winger displayed her aerial skills before powering over near the right corner.

“Yeah, just a bit of communication into our out-half Nicole,” she said of her latest Celtic Challenge try. “She just lets it fly and puts it on a pinpoint, and it’s my job to get up there and to catch them, and to to use my leg drive.

“I suppose the work that went on before it was probably the key. Got us good front-foot ball to be able to attack like that.”

With just two rounds remaining, only two points separate the Clovers from the Wolfhounds at the top of the table. Fogarty’s charges close out the cross-border competition with two more trips to Scotland and Wales.

The Clovers face Edinburgh at Hive Stadium on Saturday afternoon (kick-off 1pm), while the Wolfhounds visit third-placed Gwalia Lightning, who are still in the hunt and just four points off the summit.

“We’ll take it one game at a time,” added Costigan. “We’re aware that this competition is about travel as well, it’s not just playing at home, so we have eyes on Edinburgh next weekend after today.

“We’ll just get into our rhythm again, and we’ll travel as a group and head to Edinburgh and hopefully put in a performance that we want to do.”