‘I HEARD THE SCREAMS’
Cora Staunton on the horror injury to her close friend and AFL colleague Bríd Stack
THE piercing screams told Cora Staunton far more than she wished to know. With 40 seconds left in the Great Western Sydney Giants pre-season clash with Adelaide Crows at the Norwood Oval earlier this month, Staunton’s team-mate and close friend Bríd Stack won a contested ball but was hit late by Crows midfielder Ebony Marinoff. The 11-time All-Ireland winner with Cork came away with a fractured C7 vertebra in her neck.
The seriousness of the injury meant a low-key game made big news over there and here.
It is still making waves as, this week, the three-match suspension initially imposed on Marinoff was quashed.
There were no reasons given. The video footage of the incident, which suggested an innocuous challenge by Marinoff, may have helped her cause. It certainly gained her public sympathy after she had been banned for ‘forceful front-on contact’.
Staunton has little interest in seeing fellow players suspended, but it grates her that elements of the public were swayed by what they could not see.
‘Because it was a practice match and there was only one camera, that was the only footage. If it had been a regular season game, there would have been more camera angles,’ says Staunton.
‘What was disappointing was that it went into the social media space. From everyone feeling sorry for Bríd in the first few days, where she was seen as the victim, it turned to making her out to be the villain because of the video footage.
‘But if you were there in real time… Bríd is very tough and I knew straight away. I was 10-15 metres away from the contest.
‘You know by the screams. They were horrendous and brought me back to the time I broke my leg.
‘You know when someone screams like that it is serious and I was with her within five seconds of the injury. I knew straight away it was very serious, as did the medical team, as did the paramedics when they arrived at the ground.
‘She was very unlucky but very lucky at the same time with regards to the injury; another millimetre and it could have been a lot more serious.
‘Initially that is what we were told and the diagnosis when she went to hospital got a little bit better. She could have been paralysed so it could have been so much worse.
‘She has some nerve damage in her arm and does not have full power but the outcome is a lot more positive than it was in the first couple of hours.’
SUPPORT
Stack’s husband, Carthach Keane, who is also in Australia along with the couple’s one-year-old son Carthach Óg, has publicly acknowledged Staunton’s support of her one-time Cork rival.
‘Cora has been like a second mom to Carthach Óg. She is a very dear friend to us,’ said Keane last week.
‘I felt kind of responsible,’ admits Staunton.
‘We had been talking about it for two years since we mooted the idea of her coming over but then she found out she was pregnant.
‘To get back fit after having a baby and to put herself in a position where she could still do this tells you just how driven she is. She was phenomenal for the first month she was here, training-wise, and she was probably our best player in that practice match before she got injured.
‘I convinced her to come over so you do feel responsible when something like this happens, but the best way you can help her is with Carthach Óg.
‘The whole group have been really supportive of her and things like that can bring you even closer.
‘I knew Bríd but I have got to know her even better over the past two months. It could have been very easy to be in a very dark place, being away from the group and feeling really down.
‘Over here, they think because of the way I attacked rehab after my leg injury, and now the way she is attacking rehab after a broken neck, the Irish are something different.’ Staunton certainly is.
At 39, she is oldest player in the AFLW which kicked off this weekend – Giants were in action against Freemantle earlier today – and her comeback from a double leg-break has won her a lot of fans.
This was partly down to the nature of the injury – she broke the tibia and fibula in her right leg in May 2019 while playing in Sydney – but mainly because she was 37 at the time.
For most that would have served as a signal to retire, but Staunton was back on the Gaelic football pitch within five months, not only helping her club Carnacon to another Mayo title, but scoring with her very first possession.
‘On the way to the hospital that day in the ambulance with a broken leg I knew how serious it was but my first question was, “How long will this take me to get back?”
‘That is what goes through your head straight away. It is like taking up AFL in the first place, it is just another challenge.
‘And once one or two people start to doubt you – and they are not really but you are half making it up – that just drives you on. I am sure Bríd would be the same.’
Thing is, it is unlikely there is anyone in the ladies GAA world quite like Staunton. An 11-time All-Star footballer, a serial champion with Mayo and Carnacon, who excelled at soccer and threw her hand in at rugby, she has saved her greatest trick until last.
In 2018, when she was 35, she blazed a pathway for female GAA players to a new world.
GREEN WAVE
Despite the Covid chaos, there will still be 14 Irish players in this year’s AFLW – down from 18 last year.
The women’s game is still semiprofessional, which means most players hold down other jobs. However, that is not how it works for the Irish recruits.
‘We don’t work because there are visa restrictions so we are basically full-time athletes. Not having to work, the recovery it allows, the access to facilities that you maybe don’t have at home to make yourself better and recover better is huge.
‘At home, life is very hectic, it is full-time work, inter-county and club football. And life outside of work and football, you tend to be doing some sort of ambassadorial role. You’re doing stuff all the time.
‘I knew a couple of years ago that life was very hectic. Between training, work and the other stuff, it could mean being on the go for 15-16 hours a day so you were not getting time to recover.
‘Here, I struggle to fill my down time. I think that is a big part of the reason why I am still playing.
‘They are very much about managing the load and not over training. It is a thing I still probably struggle with,’ she admits.
She remains as addicted to elite sport now as she was when she made her debut with Mayo in 1995, aged just 13.
In this environment, like a sugarcrazed kid in a sweet shop, she can’t
‘ANOTHER MILLIMETRE AND IT COULD HAVE BEEN A LOT WORSE’
stop sampling what is available. She breathlessly lays out a typical training regime for pre-season that sees training four days a week, a cocktail of massages, physio, video analysis, team meetings, two-hour pitch sessions, one-hour gym routines, recovery, ice baths and, finally and reluctantly, home.
‘Bríd and I would go in early sometimes to do some craft (skill) sessions, but on a regular training day you go in at 3pm and you are lucky to be out of it by 9pm.
‘And then there is optional stuff that you can do yourself. I like to do a bit of extra craft work and because I am old fashioned, a bit more upper body work and a bike session here and there.
‘Between it all, I am in the club five if not six times a week in preseason. I love the place.’
That work has paid off handsomely, too. In 21 games, she has kicked 19 goals for the Giants, and after rehabbing from her leg-break, last year was her most prolific as she scored eight in seven games.
This, she insists, is a sport where the older player can thrive, pointing to 35-year-old Erin Philips of Adelaide who has recovered from an ACL injury, and has twice been voted Player of the Year.
But as the AFLW has taken root, so have the underage structures that will feed homegrown players to the clubs. The age profile of players is now dropping season-onseason.
It is the first evidence that the AFL’s investment in funding the league is paying off but there is more. Last year, the average attendance per game across the league’s 48 games was near 4,500.
PROGRESS
This season, for the first time supporters will be charged for tickets. The price may be a nominal $10 but the league is taking its first tentative steps towards self-sustainability and full-time professionalism.
‘It is like ladies’ Gaelic football at home, the ladies’ game is the fastest growing sport here now. In the next two to three years we will have a full 18-team competition and in the next five-plus years it will be a full-time professional sport. ‘All games are televised on either Seven or Fox and they are streamed through different apps as well.
‘The media rights have not been sold yet and that will be the next step for the games to be shown by a media company, which could happen in the next year or two.’
The league’s media exposure now extends to Ireland after TG4 began broadcasting deferred matches last night. There will also be a weekly highlights package.
Staunton believes there is a market for such a programme.
‘When I was growing up, I had no female role models in televised sport. The only female athlete I could look up to was Sonia O’Sullivan because she was the only one on television.
‘I have had numerous queries and messages from parents and girls, through letters and social media about how they can get into the AFLW because they would love this kind of lifestyle.
‘Seeing full games and highlights packages is only going to enhance ambitions of those who are interested to try this.
‘It is a huge opportunity to try semi-professional sport and there are not too many opportunities to do that in Ireland.’
The opportunity, particularly if the AFLW goes full-time, could still present itself to Staunton given her elevated status at the Giants.
That may not be for much longer on the field, but her value to the club goes deeper than the goals she kicks.
‘I know the time is coming, whether it will be this season or next season, it is going to be either one. I just have to see how the body holds up. It is nearly trying to get through each game at this stage. But once I am enjoying it and I feel I am contributing something that is the main thing. I always sit down with the club before I head home and have that conversation and see where things are at.
‘A big part of the role I have here is off the pitch, mentoring other people and helping them develop because we have a lot of them who have moved away from home. I have built up a relationship with a lot of the younger girls between the ages of 18-21, mentoring, supporting and trying to make them better people and athletes.’
HOME DRAW
That could potentially offer her a new life in Australia long term – she is not currently employed at home since stepping away from her post as a health promotion officer to Mayo Travellers Support Group – but the pull of home is still strong.
‘You grow to love it here, for sure. I love the lifestyle, it is very laid back and being involved in the coaching elements as well.
‘We are based in Adelaide because the borders to New South Wales are closed due to a 15-case Covid outbreak before Christmas, but they will open soon and we will go back to Sydney.
‘We have our Covid testing but that is it. When I walk around here, we are 15 minutes outside the city near the beach and it is very normal, no mask-wearing or anything like that.
‘There certainly is a draw here but it is difficult in that it is so far away from home.
‘I could never see myself letting Carnacon down and not playing for them as long as I am able to.
‘It is like been torn between the two clubs, I have as much love for the Giants as I do Carnacon and you would never want to let either of them down.’
‘I will see. I was doing some media stuff with RTÉ at home which I really enjoyed, but when I do go home, I will be looking for full-time employment,’ she says.
In the meantime, even despite the Aussies growing their own, the demand for Irish players will exist long-term, she predicts.
‘There will be less demand for bigger numbers but they will certainly want two or three Irish players in a club because we bring something different. That is the best way I can describe it.
‘All the Irish players who play here bring something different whether we are fierce and ferocious, or whether it is our footwork. They see we are quite tough and very driven. I think we are wired a little bit different.’
If so, in Cora Staunton, the AFLW have been gifted the prototype.