US-born Athlone Town forward Kelly Brady insists she\u2019s equipped to lead Ireland\u2019s charge if called upon after the FAI Cup final.<\/p>\n
Brady\u2019s goalscoring prowess \u2013 a golden boot haul of 19 in the league, accompanied by a Champions League strike against Red Star Belgrade and a pair apiece in the FAI and All-Island Cup \u2013 has earned her an international call.<\/p>\n
Although it\u2019s only to train with the squad next week for the playoff against Belgium, Brady could soon find herself the cure to Carla Ward\u2019s search for attacking reinforcements.<\/p>\n
Brady will complete her first season in Ireland after Sunday\u2019s decider against Bohemians and is likely to join the exodus of departees for fresh pastures.<\/p>\n
\u201cI have my passport and am all ready to go,\u201d said the forward, born in Tomkin\u2019s Cove, New York, about her Ireland ambitions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m always hoping for that call-up. I was under Carla\u2019s radar from being top scorer and she\u2019s watching more talent in the league.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Brady\u2019s Irish roots are deep, so adjusting to the Midlands lifestyle was a doddle. She recently completed her job as a barista in downtown Athlone as she plans a return Stateside once the final and Ireland duty are finished.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy Dad is from Castleblaney in Co Monaghan and my Mom’s father is from Kinvara, Galway,\u201d she explained about her background, which entailed participating in F\u00e9ile na nGael at 14.<\/p>\n
\u201cI came over last November to check it out and felt homely. This was the place I wanted to be.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
It got a bit rocky last month when Athlone\u2019s march towards the double was jolted by the sudden resignation of manager Colin Fortune.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo team wants to change management in the middle of the season, especially with the season we\u2019re having,\u201d she revealed about the changeover to caretaker boss John Sullivan. \u201cThe girls came together, put our heads down, knowing what we could do and stuck together.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Now they\u2019re red-hot favourites to complete the double by seeing off a Bohs team they finished seven places and 20 points ahead of in the table.<\/p>\n
\u201cBohs are a quick, youthful and aggressive team, so we need to go at them,\u201d she vowed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"US-born Athlone Town forward Kelly Brady insists she\u2019s equipped to lead Ireland\u2019s charge if called upon after the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":88140,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1113,61,60,2539,5782,43,5783],"class_list":{"0":"post-88139","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ireland","8":"tag-fai","9":"tag-ie","10":"tag-ireland","11":"tag-league-of-ireland","12":"tag-local-soccer","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-premiership"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88139","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=88139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88139\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88140"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}