Marion Farrelly relishing second coming with Meath after playing comeback

After originally returning to the inter-county football scene in a different capacity last year, 2024 has seen Marion Farrelly enjoying a fresh lease of life at the fulcrum of the Meath attack.

Two years after captaining the Royal County to an All-Ireland Minor 'B' title against Roscommon, Farrelly started in the forward line when Meath were beaten by Tyrone in the TG4 All-Ireland Intermediate Football Championship decider of 2018 at Croke Park.

While she was an extended panellist when the Royals finally got their hands on a national intermediate crown at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, the St Michael’s club star spent much of that campaign commuting up and down from Cork where she was studying for a Masters of Science in Physiotherapy at UCC.

A subsequent desire to focus on her college work meant Farrelly missed out on Meath’s outstanding league and championship successes in the two years that followed, before 2023 saw her answering a call to join the Meath set-up as a physiotherapist. This helped her to regain an appetite for featuring at the highest level once again and when new manager Shane McCormack approached her about a potential playing comeback last winter, Farrelly jumped at the opportunity.

"I probably would have missed a lot of the craic, so I think last year made me want to go back a little bit more versus other years when you’re not as close. Last year I was on the sideline and you’re nearly stopping yourself from going onto the pitch. I knew last year I wanted to do it this year," Farrelly explained.

"I always had it in the back of my mind when I stopped in 2018 or even 2020, that I would always like to go back and give it a couple of years of good commitment.

"I probably would, in previous years,