Cork's Amy O'Connor: Davy Fitzgerald instilled belief in me

After losing both the championship and league deciders in 2022, Cork are back to take another swing at national silverware in this weekend's Very Camogie Division 1A final.

Standing opposite them once again are Galway, twice All-Ireland champions in the last four years, and who edged them in last year's league final.

Camogie has, for the past decade, been a private fiefdom for the Cork-Galway-Kilkenny triumvirate. One of the trio has won every All-Ireland title since 2013 and all bar four league titles in the 21st century.

The 2023 league offered tentative evidence of a break-up of the cartel, with All-Ireland champions Kilkenny slumping to defeat to Clare, while Galway were turned over by Tipperary.

Come league final day in HQ, it's two members of the old guard duelling once again.

"We're looking forward to it," says Cork captain Amy O'Connor.

"Galway are a really good team, very tactically aware. Every time we play them, they pose questions to us that we need to go and find the answers to. We enjoy playing against them because it's a huge challenge. Hopefully, this week we can get people into Croke Park and it'll be an entertaining game.

"We beat Kilkenny in the league and Galway pipped us. There's never anything between the teams. Which is obviously brilliant for camogie. It's always a one or two point game, which is not good for us in a way, your heart, it'd be in your mouth!"

Cork manager Matthew Twomey has a new-look coaching team behind him, with former Dublin and Clare hurling coach Liam Cronin joining the set-up, alongside Wesley O'Brien on the strength and conditioning brief.

However, it is a departed coach who still attracts the most attention. Davy Fitzgerald was part of the Cork camogie management team last year, as