‘I never thought I’d be back at Croker at 36’
URSULA JACOB is one of the all-time greats of camogie, a four-time AllIreland winner with Wexford and in pursuit of a fourth AIB All-Ireland senior club title with Oulart-The Ballagh as they clash with Galway side Sarsfields at Croke Park today (4pm - Live RTÉ 2). That knowledge and experience, allied with an ability to articulate, has made her a fulcrum of RTÉ’s team of Gaelic Games pundits.
She knows what it is to compete in the white heat of battle with it all on the line, her playing career coming after being reared around genderless hurling, as the daughter of Wexford great Mick Jacob, and sister of Helena, Rory and Michael, Wexford players all.
It shows. ‘I’m so used to talking about GAA whether it’s camogie or hurling when I was at home. My parents spoke to me and my sister the exact same as they spoke to my two brothers about hurling or camogie. It was never really viewed much different. When I was asked by RTÉ to first go on the camogie panel when I’d retired I jumped at the chance. Then the opportunity came about working on the hurling side of things.
‘At the start, you’re kind of saying, “Oh my God, I’ve watched The Sunday Game all my life, and I’m now sitting alongside an Anthony Daly or Donal Óg Cusack or Jackie Tyrrell”, and these are players that I’ve admired and respected. And I suppose sometimes you’d have felt intimidated going into an environment. Once you get into the room and you’re chatting with them, you forget you’re on the telly with these heroes. You’re just having a chat with someone in your local pitch or on the street or whatever. They respect my opinion.
‘I think Donal Óg Cusack can talk about camogie as much as I can talk about hurling. I think we need to get over the kind of gender thing. Obviously, you’ll always have people who won’t be happy about it but as long as I feel that I’m doing a good job, I just get on with.’
A thick skin is necessary. Check. So is a balanced approach to peaks and troughs. Check. Oh, and being able to juggle a multitude of balls. Check. She has combined the playing and punditry with her job as a staff officer with Tusla. Throwing in a wedding between All-Irelands
might have broken a lesser woman, but then Stacey Kehoe was married the day before the December decider against Sarsfields and was player of the match. So you couldn’t complain, not that it’s in her nature. ‘Every week I’m just running around… I’m pretty good at the whole multitasking and at managing a workload. The last five, six months have been just manic but it’s been really positive and enjoyable. I’ve probably never enjoyed my camogie as much as the last couple of years, and that’s a probably a strange thing to say considering it was such a disruptive couple of years in one way, but I think
playing camogie, it gave all of us a distraction. I just think the older you do get, you only have one guarantee: that you’re playing a final on Sunday. You can’t look past that so you’re kind of fully embracing and enjoying the moment.’
As a camogie player, Jacob has always been pure class. She was the freetaker who could be relied upon to remain cool under the most suffocating of pressure. But she was dynamite from play too. Still is, as testified by her rocket to the top corner for the goal in the semifinal defeat of Scariff Ogonnelloe.
And when big-time plays were needed, she delivered. In the 2011 All-Ireland final, when she was captain, Jacob rifled 1-2 in the final ten minutes to secure victory for Wexford when they had been treading water against Galway. The goal was sensational, an aerial catch, a couple of steps to make space and a rifled shot to the net.
Who will ever forget the reaction of co-commentator Cyril Farrell 12 months later after her incredible goal eight minutes from the end of normal time, which cemented the three-in-a-row?
‘That’s un-REAL,’ bellowed the Galway man and he was spot on. It was one of the great goals scored at Croke Park, as Jacob propelled the sliotar off the sod into the opposite corner, beyond Cork legend Aoife Murray, from just to the right of the square while running away from goal.
Jacob followed up with two quick points – one from tight to the sideline – and a two-point game was dead and buried. She finished the day as player of the match, with 2-7 of the Yellowbellies’ 3-13.
Think Carey, think Cantona, think Jordan. Think Jacob.
‘I look back fondly on those experiences in Croke Park because we had a special group of girls. And I’ve been lucky enough to achieve it with the club as well.
‘I’ve kind of warriored along with the likes of Mary and Úna (Leacy), Karen Atkinson and Ciara Storey, and Shelly and Stacey Kehoe, and you’re just in each other’s pockets.
‘But you do look back more now and definitely the goal (in 2012) is a standout for me. It was a great strike and it helped us win.’
Jacob knows that it is more than she could ever have dreamed of to be striding out onto Croke Park one more time, for the club, with an AllIreland on the line.
‘It’s ten years since we’ve been in our first final where we played Drom & Inch. If someone had said to me back in 2012 that we’d be back again in a final and the core of the team’s still there ten years later, I would’ve been saying there’s no way I’d be there still at 36 years of age back in Croke Park.
‘There is a real sense of community in Oulart and The Ballagh and all of Wexford. And I’m thrilled especially to see the older people in the community getting so much from it and going to matches and talking about the matches. Maybe it’s coming out of Covid and all that but I think that is what makes the club championship that bit more special, and I take so much pride in the red and black of Oulart-The Ballagh being represented in Croke Park on All-Ireland final day.
‘If you can’t enjoy that and be looking forward to being a part of that, I don’t know what to say.’
Rendering Ursula Jacob speechless? Almost as rare as her being held scoreless. Once more unto the breach, with her friends.