In her debut AFLW season, Amy Boyle-Carr’s meteoric rise to becoming a mainstay of the Adelaide Crows team has been one of the feel-good stories of this season.
With only two matches of the regular season remaining ahead of next month’s finals series, Donegal’s three-time Ulster Champion is leading the charge for a top-four spot for Adelaide.
The premiership contenders are sitting pretty in third spot on the season ladder but remain far from comfortable with reigning champions Brisbane only behind on percentage followed by the Richmond Tigers and Fremantle Dockers only one win back in fifth and sixth respectively.
Adelaide host unbeaten ladder leaders North Melbourne Kangaroos this weekend followed by a trip to the Geelong Cats in their final match of the league campaign.
One win should secure a top-four spot, but it will be squeaky bum time if they have to beat the Cats to make it.
Forkhill woman Amy Mulholland is the only other Ulster woman out of nine in AFLW this year to be in pole position for finals football.
The Dockers take on the lowly Greater Western Sydney Giants this weekend and will host the struggling Western Bulldogs in their final game, but even two wins may not be sufficient to leapfrog both Richmond and Brisbane into the top four.
Shane O’Neills and Armagh footballer Blaithin Mackin could make it a trio of Ulster women to feature in the AFLW play-offs for the Melbourne Demons.
The in-form Demons will face second-place Hawthorn in Cairns tomorrow and wooden spoon favourites Collingwood in their final game.
Having won their past four consecutive matches, Melbourne will have to win both of their last two games to sneak into the top eight ahead of either Port Adelaide in seventh or Essendon who occupy the last finals spot in eighth.
Fermanagh star Blaithin Bogue has not played a single minute for North Melbourne this year and at this stage will have to wait until next year to make her AFLW debut.
