On Wednesday, Athlone Town will be in Scotland for a crucial opening leg in the first qualifying round of the inaugural Women's Europa Cup against Glasgow City.
At the weekend, the reigning SSE Airtricity Women's Premier Division champions will then face Shamrock Rovers in a Sports Direct Women's FAI Cup semi-final that has been rescheduled for Sunday.
Next week they will play Glasgow in their European second leg before resuming their domestic title charge, having built up a four-point lead over second-placed Shelbourne with five games to go.
All has been looking rosey on the pitch for the Midlands club and it is in that context that Colin Fortune's shock resignation as manager was announced by Athlone on Sunday.
While Athlone's players and supporters comprehend the turn of events, it has also caught their rivals by surprise.
Speaking on the RTÉ Soccer Podcast, Shelbourne midfielder and former Republic of Ireland international Rachel Graham said it was unclear how the Athlone squad will be impacted in the short-term given how close Fortune's departure has come to a Glasgow tie, which she had last week viewed as not insurmountable.
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"It's obviously not ideal timing for Athlone and the girls going into all these games. It's hard to do it without a manager but they just have to deal with it," Graham said.
"But it's possibly the worst timing to lose your manager."
On how it could impact the squad for Wednesday, Graham added: "Sometimes players are really resilient and just get on with it and it doesn't really affect them. I don't think anything drastic is going to change from the 11 that they've usually been playing in such a short time.
The managerial upheaval notwithstanding, she believes Athlone can also use the fact that they play away first against Glasgow as a positive in their tie, and she also feels that they have enough quality and cohesion within their squad to keep up their fight in the hectic title run-in against her own Shelbourne side, having beaten Shamrock Rovers 2-0 at the weekend to extend their lead.
"If you're looking at their run-in for the end of the league, this was the game that was probably going to be the one where they might slip up, where they might have one eye on the Glasgow game and it's a tough Rovers team," she said.
"But in fairness, they got the job done, 2-0, clean sheet and now they're top of the table and we've obviously slipped up in our game which opens the gap up a bit more and takes it out of our hands.
"On their end, they're getting the job done and we've fallen short in the last couple of games."
"I just think Athlone have performed really well all season," Graham added, "I don't think this (managerial situation) is really going to derail them as much as you might think."
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