The former captain of the Northern Ireland women’s football team, Marissa Callaghan, has spoken of her shock and gratitude at being recognised in the New Year Honours.
Callaghan, who in 2022 led the team at its first international tournament at the European Championships in England, has been made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).
The honour comes at the end of a year when the 39-year-old Cliftonville Ladies midfielder stepped down from captaining her country after eight years in the role.
“It was a massive surprise,” Callaghan told the PA news agency last week.
“I found out a few weeks ago when I got a letter through the post. The letter looked a bit fancy and I opened it and it said about getting the MBE, so I was really shocked to be honest, and obviously very honoured as well as grateful to whoever nominated me for it.”
Callaghan, who works at the Irish Football Association, has also enjoyed major recent success at club level with Cliftonville, a team she has played for throughout her two-decade career.
The north Belfast side won a second Northern Ireland Women’s Premiership title in three years last season, with a perfect campaign of 16 wins from 16 matches. The league title was part of an “invincible” domestic treble that also included winning the League Cup and Irish Cup.
Callaghan, from west Belfast, said despite all the trophies with Cliftonville, the thing she takes most pride from during her time in football is the phenomenal surge in the number of young girls in Northern Ireland playing the game since the international team qualified for the Euros.
“I suppose the thing I’m most proud of is how we inspired a generation of young girls and boys to want to play football,” she said.
“I work for the Irish FA, and I’ve seen it on the ground that whenever Northern Ireland qualified for the Euros, so many young girls wanted to start playing the game.
“And there’s been a huge increase – we’re talking probably 600% increase – in girls playing football and a massive part of that was us being so successful.”
Callaghan said the landscape facing young girls who want to get involved in the game has been transformed from her time growing up.
“Whenever I was a kid there were no girls’ teams where I was from, so you always just played in the street with the boys wherever you could,” she said.
“And it wasn’t until I was 13 that I actually got to join a girls’ team. Back then there was a very limited number of girls’ teams playing.”
Reflecting on becoming an MBE, Callaghan paid tribute to all those who have contributed to her career, singling out one of her first coaches at Cliftonville, Ann Gourley, as well as former international managers Alfie Wylie and Kenny Shiels. She also thanked Cliftonville for its support.
Callaghan, who has a young son Quinn with her wife Paula, said her family has always been her “number one” supporter.
The midfielder has completed her coaching badges and when the day finally comes to hang up her playing boots she wants to concentrate on being a youth football coach.
“Girls and women’s football has always been my passion,” she said.
“Football has given me so much. I can’t imagine where I’d be without it, to be honest.”
