![\"Former](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/3861330_1_articleinline_WhatsApp_2bImage_2b2026-07-26_2bat_2b07.07.40_2b_2_.jpeg\" "\\"Former")
Former Kildare inter-county star Neasa Dooley will represent Ireland against Australia next weekend.<\/p>\nA new contract quickly followed which sees the 26-year-old competing in the AFL for the second year in a row.<\/p>\n
If that wasn\u2019t enough Neasa has been selected on the Ireland team to face Australia in the first ever women\u2019s game under AFL Rules before a sell-out crowd of 10,000 at North Sydney Oval on Saturday next, August 1st.<\/p>\n
Speaking to the Kildare Nationalist as she prepared for the international game this week Neasa reflected positively on her rookie season with Brisbane Lions in the AFLW.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was really good. I\u2019m just going into my second season now and I\u2019m a lot more confident and knowing the game a lot more\u201d, she explained.<\/p>\n
Despite appearing in the AFLW for the first time in 2025, Dooley wasn\u2019t nervous citing a 12-to-15-week preseason as being helpful before she made her League debut in Round 2 and scored two goals as an interchange player.<\/p>\n
She enjoyed the change in lifestyle from a full-time job and playing football in Ireland to playing and training full time Down Under.<\/p>\n
Former Kildare inter-county star Neasa Dooley will represent Ireland against Australia next weekend.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Ireland you\u2019re out very early for work and home very late at night but here there\u2019s so much more free time,\u201d she told us.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou\u2019re still working essentially for your five days a week but in a much more professional environment where you can focus a lot on yourself and make sure you\u2019re getting the best out of what you\u2019re doing in training and recovery to allow you to play quite well in games,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
The former Athy player scored many crucial goals for her club and county but her first two goals in her debut game with Brisbane Lions gave her equal enjoyment.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere was a buzz to get the two goals my debut game, yeah, definitely, it\u2019s good scoring goals in the net,\u201d she said excitedly.<\/p>\n
Being involved with Brisbane Lions allows for plenty of recognition from the fans but Neasa is able to take all that in her stride. Winning an All-Ireland with Kildare was special for the former Lilywhite sharpshooter.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously, the All-Ireland with Kildare was huge. It\u2019s your hometown and it\u2019s your your county. I really loved playing with Kildare and our achievements. The Grand Final result here was a disappointment last year but I\u2019m looking forward to what\u2019s ahead and hopefully we can get there again this year,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Unlike playing in Ireland where the closed season is short Neasa Dooley enjoyed a long closed season in the AFLW running from December last year to mid-May of this year, which allowed her to do some travelling.<\/p>\n
\u201cI got to the United States and visited New York, New Orleans and Nashville,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n
\u201cI got to go home for three weeks which was very nice as well. When I got back to Australia, I visited the likes of Sydney and Melbourne. You have those six months off to travel and make good use of it. We had our first practice two weeks ago; that\u2019s the first time I\u2019ve played since the Grand Final. Back home I was playing 365 days a year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Pre-season in the AFLW is a mixture of the hard slog and skills training while a great emphasis is placed on S&C.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re very big on the skills over here so it\u2019s always included within the sessions but the hard slog and the hard running is paying off now towards the end of the preseason, as we\u2019re only a couple of weeks away from Round 1. It\u2019s a lot more of a contact sport, more physical, so you want to keep the strength up and keep that extra bit of cushioning on for the hard tackles,\u201d Neasa explained.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/3861331_1_articleinline_WhatsApp_Image_2026-07-26_at_07.07.40_281_29.jpeg\" "\\"\\"")
<\/p>\n
The Kildare county player is delighted to have been included along with two of her Brisbane Lions team mates, Jennifer Dunne (Dublin) and Orla O\u2019Dwyer (Tipperary) on the Ireland team to face Australia on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Three other Lions team mates are on the Australia team which gives rise to plenty of banter between the six players. New Swans Coach, Colin O\u2019Riordan (Tipperary) is part of the Irish Management Team along with Dooley\u2019s Brisbane Lions Coach, Craig Starcevich.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe assemble in Sydney early next week and we get together on Thursday and Friday. There are a couple of activities and events planned for us around the game,\u201d Neasa told us.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to be able to show off what we can do as an Irish team. We want to play the same and use our weapons such speed and our skills to hopefully come away with a couple of scores of the board. At the end of the day, we were not going there just to show up,\u201d Dooley said defiantly.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo put on the green jersey, something I thought I\u2019d never do and we\u2019re making history is pretty cool. Representing Ireland but also your family at home is a is pretty special feeling,\u201d she added proudly. Being a coach herself is not something Neasa would rule out.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s always nice to help out, especially with the younger generation in the home club that I\u2019ve been a part of myself and show my appreciation for all the years they gave me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Before all that, Neasa is concentrating on playing for Ireland on Saturday next and with Brisbane Lions in the season ahead.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo go out there and make history (on Saturday) and hopefully get a bit of silverware at the end of it is what I\u2019m looking forward to. Beyond that I\u2019m looking forward to the new season with the club. Hopefully we\u2019ll make a good start but we\u2019ll take it game by game and see how we go,\u201d she concluded.<\/p>\n
\n B: Kayleigh Cronin, Jennifer Dunne.<\/p>\n
\n HB: Erika O’Shea, Grace Kelly, Sinead Goldrick.<\/p>\n
\n C: Niamh Kelly, Aisling McCarthy, Dayna Finn.<\/p>\n
\n HF: Sarah Rowe, Vikki Wall, Orla O’Dwyer.<\/p>\n
\n F: Aishling Moloney, Aine McDonagh.<\/p>\n
\n Foll: Eilish O’Dowd, Erone Fitzpatrick, Niamh McLaughlin.<\/p>\n
\n I\/C: Blaithin Bogue, Amy Boyle-Carr, Neasa Dooley, Amy Gavin Mangan, Rachel Kearns, Tanya Kennedy, Orlagh Lally, Niamh Martin, Paris McCarthy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fromhumble beginnings with her club, Athy, to League and All Ireland glory with Kildare LGFA, Neasa Dooley continues…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-573497","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}