ROLL the clocks back a year to this very stage and you can almost get deja vu given what has played out throughout the 2026 campaign for Antrim's Ladies football squad.
A huge promotion to the second-tier of the National Football League where they will be facing the likes of Dublin, Tyrone, Mayo and of course their recently acquired arch-nemesis - Louth.
Since the announcement of the co-management team of Chris Scullion and Mickey Devlin, Antrim's LGFA have went from strength to strength earning consecutive promotions, clinching the Ulster Junior football title twice in succession, yet one trophy eludes them - the Junior All-Ireland.
Since the Glenavy duo took over, to claim their input has been a resounding success is putting it lightly.
The media attention and sponsorship deals that have began to spring up for the ladies involved since the victories began flowing is no doubt a direct result of that, and all that remains a clear indicator of the rise in success that Antrim have discovered since October 2024.
Despite wiping the floor with the competition for the most-part, only two teams have managed to get the better of the Saffron ladies, one being Louth (Division Three league final and All-Ireland 2025 Final) and despite cruising to Ulster Championship glory, neighbours Derry managed to bloody the noses of Antrim with a group stage victory in the All-Ireland Junior campaign.
Manager Chris Scullion told the Andersonstown News how despite an overall great season, the Derry game was a point of reflection for his side which helped them be spurred on to finish strongly in the group stage.
"Yeah it was an extremely strong finish and we are proud of the girls, this is the fifth semi-final in a row we wanted to give ourselves a chance to rectify the wrongs of last year so to be in this position is something we are proud of the girls for doing." he said.
"We started the campaign off well with a big win over Offaly and it gave us confidence going into the next game against Derry but our performance just was not there and full credit to Derry they've played us twice prior and we've came out on top so to get one over on us you have to really give them credit for that.
"But, we used that game as a point of reflection and myself and the rest of the management team sat down and looked back at what went wrong and where it went wrong for us that day and see if anything needed some fine-tuning.
"Going into the Longford tie, we wanted to put that defeat behind us and fairplay to our girls they went out and gave a great account of themselves and scored a serious tally to put away a decent Longford team.
"And then finally going into Kilkenny we knew we had some catching up on the points difference on Derry and we set ourselves a target and the girls did us proud and we did it and managed to get back into the top spot, so yeah we are delighted and very happy to now be in a position to play Sligo in the semi-final."
Speaking on the final game against Kilkenny, Chris said that he was proud of his girls as they had a professional job to do despite the lack of quality that the opposition showed in attacking areas.
"Unfortunately it just had to be that way for us, I actually apologised to the Kilkenny coaches as it was a rout from our girls, but at the end of the day we respected our opponents and gave them as much effort as we could, at the end of the day we needed a big win to top the group.
"Our overall objective was to top the group, we knew that it was massive for us to win and win convincingly and credit to Kilkenny they are only starting out but they understood we really had to give ourselves the best chance with a massive win and hope for Derry to lose in the final game.
"They were probably missing a few duals and respect to them for trying to grow the football down there, it's not nice to be given out margins of victory like that at this level, but at the end of the day we needed it to secure top spot."
Chris believed that the Kilkenny game came at the perfect time allowing some key players a chance to rest and getting the confidence amongst the squad as Antrim posted a score of 12-31 on the day.
STRONG LEADERS: Chris Scullion will hope his side can repeat last season's result against Sligo
"For us we were able to get the shackles off and give some rests to our players who are on the red zone and it was a great confidence booster and to be honest the scoreline was just a few goals over my initial objective," he added.
"I'd asked for ten goals and 30 points and we surpassed that which was fantastic to see of course, but again it's purely from a selfish point of view, the girls had a professional job to do and they went out and managed to do even more than that."
The Antrim LGFA co-manager is hopeful that his team can get the job done once again, but his final message to his team will be to play with confidence that and joy that they know they can show.
"The final message is to enjoy the occasion - stick to what we are good at and stick to our plan. We know nerves are part and parcel of playing a stage like this but I will just tell the girls to focus on their own games and enjoy the occasion once again.
"We are hopeful that as a group we can get past the hurdle and hard-work has always been our message for this team. They know what is required and they know the intensity that is being brought to the game that Sligo will win.
"Put in the effort, stick to the game plan and it's in our hands that is all I can ask and hopefully we can prevail and I believe the result will take care of itself."
TG4 All-Ireland Junior Championship semi-final
Antrim v Sligo
Sunday July 12
St Tiernach's Park (Clones)
2pm
The match will be streamed on the TG4 YouTube channel.
