Amber Barrett fired Ireland to the World Cup - and dedicated her historic goal to the 10 victims of the Creeslough tragedy.
The Donegal native, who celebrated her strike by pointing to the black armband on her sleeve, revealed afterwards that she knew some of the victims.
Barrett, whose grandparents hail from the small town in north Donegal, said: “I know Cresslough like the back of my hand.
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“My grandparents are born and bred there. I spend my holidays there with my uncle.
“I know people who died in the tragedy, who were affected by it, who were first on the scene.
“I’ve been sombre the last few days. This is the best day of my life in terms of what we have done for football.
“But when you put it into perspective, compared to what happened over there last Friday, this doesn’t scratch the surface.
“I’m dedicating this result and the goal to the 10 beautiful souls who unfortunately perished, for all their families.
“I know they touched their lives and they have touched ours. This is for Cresslough. This is for Donegal.”
Ireland are on their way to Australia and New Zealand next summer without the need for involvement in next February’s intercontinental play-off.
Portugal’s win over Iceland means automatic qualification for Vera Pauw’s side, who survived a Scottish onslaught after Barrett’s 72nd minute goal.
“That was the longest 20 minutes of my life after that goal,” admitted Barrett. “I do not know what we have just done. Seeing the people here and those at home, this is for all of them and the kids growing up.
“One thing I’ve been taught, I didn’t always listen, was to take my first touch across the defender. It took me away and then I did the old reliable, I just big-toed it, I just put it in the corner.
“I knew the keeper wouldn’t come off the line, so I couldn’t chip her.”
Barrett added that manager Pauw would have to include her in the squad next summer.
“If she wants to win the World Cup, she needs to have me on the plane,” she joked.
Skipper Katie McCabe, meanwhile, paid tribute to her teammates, saying: “I’m speechless, it doesn’t feel real, to be honest. I’m just so proud of the girls.
“We ran our socks off tonight. This one (Denise O’Sullivan) covered every inch of Hampden, everybody was unbelievable, Courtney with the penalty save, Amber coming on and scoring the goal; we’re going to the World Cup!”
McCabe added: “People might not like our style of play and the defending, but we love it.
“We love the defending, we are passionate about it, it’s our identity and we catch teams out on the counter-attack like we did tonight.
“It’s our strength and it gets us results.
“We’ve been on a great run so far and to come here, a difficult place to come, obviously away from home, we had our travelling fans here, we were against it and we were the underdogs, but we always are and we love it.
“We get the results, we prove people wrong and we’re going to the World Cup.”
It was O’Sullivan’s pass that sent Barrett through for the winner and the Cork native said: “We spoke about it beforehand, all we needed was one chance and we caught them on the counter.
“It turned, the space was wide open and I played Amber through and it was a great finish from her.
“I’m very proud, we’ve a lot of fans out here tonight so we want to thank them. We are going to a World Cup. It’s a dream come true for all of us.”
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