Should Courtney Brosnan and Casey Murphy fill the goalkeeping slots for, respectively, the Republic of Ireland and the United States in either, or both, of the upcoming friendlies between the sides, the childhood friends from New Jersey will probably have a chuckle over how their paths have crossed again.
As youngsters, the pair were team-mates at the players development academy in their native state, both so gifted their coach couldn’t separate them – so they largely ended up sharing the goalkeeping duties for the academy’s Slammers side, which won the Under-15 national title.
Murphy now plays for North Carolina Courage in the National Women’s Soccer League, where her captain is Denise O’Sullivan, while Brosnan is in her fourth season in England’s Women’s Super League, joining Everton from West Ham two years ago. But while they’ve taken different routes along the way, they’ve always stayed in touch.
“Casey is a good friend and we’ve been texting back and forth, looking forward to meeting back up. It’s amazing for me to see her do so well in the NWSL and on the US team. And it’s cool for her to see me do well for Ireland and over in the WSL. So I’m really looking forward to getting back to seeing her on the pitch.”
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“We grew up playing together since we were quite young, we played on the same team at PDA. That team was very, very good, we had quite a long spell where we didn’t lose any games. The coach was quite up front about having two great goalkeepers, so he kind of let us split the time together. It was a pivotal time for us both to develop and get off to college and then go professional. It really shaped me and helped me grow, to be competing against someone that also was such an elite level player.”
Later, the pair ended up being picked for the same Under-23 United States squad, but Brosnan opted to stick with the Republic of Ireland, for whom she had played at Under-17 and Under-19 level, qualifying through her father Shawn’s parents who emigrated to the States from Kerry and Roscommon in the 1950s.
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Brosnan received her first call-up to the senior Irish squad in November 2018, with Colin Bell then the manager, but didn’t make her debut until March 2020 when Vera Pauw picked her for the Euro 2021 qualifier away to Montenegro.
She kept a clean sheet that day, in a 3-0 win, and has kept nine more in her 19 caps, currently on a remarkable streak of seven in a row.
It hasn’t been plain sailing, though, she’s had her battles at club level, spending a good spell of this season on the bench at Everton where her rival for the goalkeeping position is Emily Ramsey, the highly rated young England squad member who is on loan from Manchester United.
And it wasn’t until after her 11th cap for Ireland that she began to nail down a regular place in the side, often having to play second – or third – fiddle to Marie Hourihan and Grace Moloney. But in the last 17 games, Brighton’s Megan Walsh has been the only other goalkeeper to start for Ireland when she made her debut against Russia in the Pinatar Cup in February of last year.
That run of clean sheets has made Brosnan, on the whole, undroppable. And none was more valuable than the one she kept in Glasgow last October, when she saved a penalty on the night Ireland qualified for the World Cup.
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There was a warm embrace waiting for her when she returned to Everton. “He was one of the first to come up to me, to give me a hug and just say how proud he was, how the whole country was behind us and that they were really excited for us. Yeah, it made it really special. That just shows his character and how special the guy he is. That was really cool for me.”
Seamus Coleman, of course.
No lack of support at Everton, then, and she won’t be short of it either in the games against the US.
“So in Austin, my dad’s going to be there. And I have quite a few friends from back home in New Jersey, friends from growing up that are coming. Two of my best friends and her sister and dad are coming, and then my other friend and her fiance are coming, so I have a big group. And then my mom and sister are meeting my dad in Saint Louis, so they’ll be at that one as well.” There’ll barely be room for the home support.
But it’ll be a big ask to extend her run of clean sheets against the World Cup holders and top ranked nation in the world, only one goalkeeper achieving the feat against the States in their last 22 games, Misa Rodriguez in Spain’s 2-0 friendly win in Pamplona last October.
This quality of opposition, though, is precisely what Ireland need in the build-up to the World Cup, she says. “We know how difficult the World Cup will be, so you need to be replicating the type of games you’re going to get there. It’s way better to be playing high ranked opponents so you can test yourself and see where you’re at.”
If her old pal Murphy gets picked for these games, Brosnan will hope that she’s kept just as busy as she expects to be.
