Laura Ward is hoping that experience will help Sarsfields get across the line in Sunday’s AIB Camogie All-Ireland Senior Club Championship final however the Galway women know that it is not a deciding factor when it comes to finals at Croke Park.
Ward is arriving to GAA headquarters alongside her all-conquering team-mates, who have won the last two finals, and are looking to make it four out of five, having also won the trophy in 2020 when they stopped Derry’s Slaughtneil from making it a record-equalling four in a row.
Victory on Sunday would make it three in a row for the Tribes who last tasted defeat in the 2021 final against Wexford’s Oulart-The Ballagh.
Sarsfields exacted revenge for that defeat in the 2021-22 final, and added another in the same calendar year, beating Loughiel Shamrocks from Antrim in December.
But this year, the three-time winners are up against the relatively inexperienced side, Dicksboro, albeit they hail from the same county as St Paul’s who have eight All-Irelands under their belt.
The Kilkenny champions will always bring an element of expectation to a contest, and while they have yet to compete in the national decider, Dicksboro have a team that is very capable of challenging and offering Sarfields a stern test on Sunday.
"I remember people saying, 'you have to lose one to win one’, and we still hadn’t won one’, and I was thinking in my head that we are never going to get to that day," said Ward, thinking back to those two losses to Slaughtneil in 2017 and 2018.
"Experience is important, but you see teams going to Croke Park with no experience and having a magical day, so sometimes being naive can be an advantage, having young players going in with no nerves.
"So experience, I hope, will stand to us, but it certainly won’t get us over the line.
"They (Dicksboro) are amazing from 1 to 15. They can all hurl, so it’s up to us individually in every position to perform.
"The individual battle will be key and then we’ll need one or two players to having an absolutely outstanding day.
"That could happen with Dicksboro as well; they could have a couple of players who we weren’t expecting to have an amazing day and get them over the line so you just don’t know what will happen on All-Ireland day."
Sarsfields do, however, have the benefit of playing in those four previous finals, where they won two and lost two, and it is that kind of experience that will really help Ward and her team-mates prepare for Sunday’s decider.
"The losses are definitely the ones you learn more from. You think about the losses and the mistakes that you made and you say that you will never make that mistake again.
"Motivation comes from those defeats; that feeling of being beaten at Croke Park. You never want to experience that feeling again and it helps to push you over the line."
And Ward is equally adamant that there is as much to learn from the winning performances, which will bring the confidence for the challenge that awaits at Croke Park.
"It actually hasn’t been mentioned at all," emphasised Ward, when asked about the three in a row that is on the line this weekend.
"Maybe in a few years we’ll look back and think ‘wow this is amazing’ but right now we are just trying to take advantage of every opportunity that we get.
"We’re just concentrating on this one game. It’s another All-Ireland final and we’re just taking new learnings from previous finals and trying to bring them into this final but knowing it is one that we have to give 100% to."
If experience is unlikely to be the deciding factor in this clash with the Kilkenny champions, Ward does offer some insight into her club’s recent successes, as she stressed the importance of the team accepting the responsibility on the pitch and communicating correctly throughout.
"There is not one exact thing that is key to our success, but work-rate and communication on the pitch is key, and the more we have matured and experienced we realised that it comes down to ourselves on the pitch.
"And it comes down to the fact that we are all from the one community, the one parish," added Ward.
"We went to national school together, and when we go into the shop we see each other, and we have built amazing friendships and relationships with each other.
"We are doing it for each other, we’re not doing it for someone we don’t know, you’re doing it for your best friend.
"So the motivation and will to win does come quite naturally."
Ward said that she has introduced a self-imposed media ban – making an exception for this week’s media duties – while she admitted that the analysis and exposure "goes in one ear and out the other", however, when dared to dream, she did admit that it would be a dream come true to make it a triple crown on Sunday.
"It would be every little girl’s dream (to win three in a row)," said Ward.
"It would be amazing, but this is the most important game of our lives right now. We have nothing won."
Watch the AIB Senior Camogie Club Championship final, Sarsfields (Galway) v Dicksboro (Kilkenny), on Sunday from 5pm live on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player. Watch the Intermediate final, Clanmaurice (Kerry) v Na Fianna (Meath), live on RTÉ Player from 3pm.
