Kayleigh Cronin: 'We definitely do appreciate it more'

After 31 years of hurt, the Kerry ladies ended their drought for an All-Ireland football title in August, with defender Kayleigh Cronin key to their success.

After final defeats in 2022 and 2023 to Meath and Dublin respectively, Kerry finally triumphed on the biggest day in Croke Park against Galway.

For Cronin, it was a journey of overcoming injuries and heartbreak, as she overcame a serious ACL injury in 2019, having just broke into the Kerry team.

With Covid in 2020, football was heavily disrupted, which allowed the 28-year-old to fully recover, something which is now a blessing for Kerry.

"We played Westmeath in Fitzgerald Stadium and I'd only been back playing football six months.

"My body wasn't used to it, obviously. It was non-contact in the middle of the park, I just went to turn and chase the ball back and went down like a sack of spuds and I knew straight away what it was.

"Obviously at the time, I thought the world was ending. But looking back, if there was a time for it to happen, it was probably the best time for it to happen. It happened in July, and then I had the operation in September, I think. COVID was next January, February.

"So there were games still going ahead and everything, but we actually ended up going into lockdown. I was basically doing water and I was hoping to come back around the May mark, which would have just barely been nine months. And I was testing well in May and everything.

"So number one, I was lucky because the gyms and the physios and all that were open for the first three to four months, which is obviously crucial post-op. But after that, then everything closed.

"I set up a gym in the shed at home, so I was able to continue it, but I know for a fact if I had gone back in May or