Ballinamere basketballers represent Ireland

Two girls from Ballinamere had the honour of representing Ireland last weekend in separate Basketball tournaments. Niamh Galvin played for the Irish Under 17 team against the Scottish National Team in a friendly tournament held in Belfast, while Úna O'Brien played for the Under 16 team in the European Championships being held in Podgorica, Montenegro.

Úna's team are in a particularly difficult group with opposition from Sweden, Cyprus, Bulgaria and hosts Montenegro. So far, they have narrowly lost to Sweden and also Montenegro, while they had a strong 20 point win over Cyprus. Úna showed well in her games so far, taking 3 rebounds against Sweden and scoring. She was also the joint highest scorer against Montenegro for the Irish girls. Impressively, she scored both with her stronger right hand and also her left against Montenegro, highlighting some of the dexterity skills that can be developed through basketball.

The U16 games continue throughout the week until the classification games end next Sunday.

Interestingly, one of Únas teammates is Ciara Brogan of the well-known Dublin footballing family. Both Niamh and Úna are also capable footballers with Ballinamere/Durrow LGFA.

Niamh debuted recently at midfield for the B/D senior side who are in their first ever Offaly Senior Football Championship campaign. It wouldn't be a surprise either to see Úna, despite being only 15 years old, feature in the later stages of the football championship as the B/D team is a particularly young squad at the early stages of their development as a senior force.

The two girls are from very sporting families. Úna's older sister Meadhbh is already a Superleague basketballer and captains the B/D seniors. Niamh's Dad and Uncle have both played senior football for Daingean. Both of Úna's parents have represented Offaly in football with her Dad Barney (who recently was a selector for Ballinamere hurlers) having played in the All Ireland Minor final in 1989 and played Senior for Offaly including a notable Leinster Championship win over All Ireland Champions Meath in 2000.

Ireland U16s play Bulgaria at 12:30pm on Tuesday August 15 and the game can be watched on the FIBA youtube channel.