Aimee Mackin (born 22 April 1997) is an Irish

dual code In coding theory, the dual code of a linear code :C\subset\mathbb_q^n is the linear code defined by :C^\perp = \ where :\langle x, c \rangle = \sum_^n x_i c_i is a scalar product. In linear algebra terms, the dual code is the annihilator ...

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

er from

Camlough Camlough ( ; ) is a village five kilometres west of Newry in County Armagh, Northern Ireland. The village is named after a lake, known as Cam Lough, in the parish, which is about 90 acres in extent. South of the village is Camlough Mountain (Sli ...

County Armagh County Armagh (, named after its county town, Armagh) is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. Adjoined to the southern shore of Lough Neagh, the county covers an area of and ha ...

. In

association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

she has played for

Women's Premiership The Women's Premiership, also called the RFUW Premiership was the top level of women's rugby union in England until 2017. It was formed in 1990 and was run by the Rugby Football Union for Women. It was superseded in the 2017/18 season by Premier ...

clubs Newry City and Sion Swifts, and represented the

Northern Ireland women's national football team The Northern Ireland women's national football team represents Northern Ireland in international women's football. Although most national football teams represent a sovereign state, FIFA statutes permit Northern Ireland as a member of the United ...

at both youth and senior level. She also played

ladies' Gaelic football Ladies' Gaelic football ( ga, Peil Ghaelach na mBan) is a women's team sport. It is the women's equivalent of Gaelic football. Ladies' football is organised by the Ladies' Gaelic Football Association. Two teams of 15 players kick or hand-pass a ...

for

Shane O'Neill's GAC Shane O'Neill's Gaelic Athletic Club ( ga, CLG Sheáin Uí Néill) is a GAA club from Camlough, County Armagh. It is part of Armagh GAA and its grounds are known as Páirc Sheáin Uí Néill. Shane O'Neill's currently plays Gaelic football ...

and at senior level for

Armagh GAA The Armagh County Board ( ga, Cumann Lúthchleas Gael Coiste Chontae Ard Mhacha) or Armagh GAA is one of the 32 county boards of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) in Ireland, and is responsible for the administration of Gaelic games in Cou ...

, competing in the

Ladies' National Football League The Ladies' National Football League is an annual inter-county ladies' Gaelic football tournament, secondary to the All-Ireland Senior Ladies' Football Championship. It is competed for annually by the county teams of Ireland. National League rol ...

and

All-Ireland Senior Ladies' Football Championship The All-Ireland Senior Ladies' Football Championship is the premier inter-county competition in the game of ladies' Gaelic football in Ireland. The series of games are organised by the Ladies' Gaelic Football Association and are played during the ...

. She was named the 2020

TG4 Senior Player's Player of the Year TG4 ( ga, TG Ceathair, ) is an Irish free-to-air public service television network. The channel launched on 31 October 1996 and is available online and through its on demand service TG4 Player in Ireland and beyond. TG4 was formerly known ...

Soccer career

Club career

In September 2015, Newry City won the Northern Ireland Women's Premier League, when Mackin scored a dramatic last-minute winner over Mid-Ulster Ladies. Mackin signed for Sion Swifts in March 2018 after Newry City withdrew from the Women's Premiership.

International career

Youth

In 2011 Mackin was called up to represent Northern Ireland at under-15 schoolgirl level while she attended St Paul's High School, Bessbrook. In April 2012 she was a key player in the team which retained the Bob Docherty Cup. By the following season she was participating for the

Northern Ireland women's national under-17 football team The Northern Ireland women's national under-17 football team represents Northern Ireland in international youth football competitions and is controlled by the Northern Ireland Women's Football Association (NIWFA), the women's football arm of the I ...

in their 2013 UEFA Women's Under-17 Championship qualification series. In February 2015 Mackin scored a

hat-trick A hat-trick or hat trick is the achievement of a generally positive feat three times in a match, or another achievement based on the number three. Origin The term first appeared in 1858 in cricket, to describe H. H. Stephenson taking three wic ...

for the

Northern Ireland women's national under-19 football team The Northern Ireland women's national under-19 football team represents the female under-19s of Northern Ireland in the UEFA Women's Under-19 Championship, and is controlled by the Irish Football Association. History Current squad See also ...

in a 9–1 win over

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

Solitude Solitude is a state of seclusion or isolation, meaning lack of socialisation. Effects can be either positive or negative, depending on the situation. Short-term solitude is often valued as a time when one may work, think, or rest without distu ...

Senior

Mackin made her senior debut for

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...

in October 2013, during the

2015 FIFA Women's World Cup qualification The qualification for the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup determined which 23 teams joined Canada, the hosts of the 2015 tournament, to play for the Women's World Cup. The field was expanded from 16 teams in the 2011 edition to 24 in the 2015 edit ...

campaign. She was still 16 years old when she scored against

in March 2014.

Gaelic football career

From a prominent

Gaelic Athletic Association The Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA; ga, Cumann Lúthchleas Gael ; CLG) is an Irish international amateur sporting and cultural organisation, focused primarily on promoting indigenous Gaelic games and pastimes, which include the traditional ...

(GAA) family, Mackin's father Michael served as a coach and chairman of

where Aimee and her five siblings all played. Aimee was among four of the siblings to progress to senior inter-county football with

Armagh Armagh ( ; ga, Ard Mhacha, , "Macha's height") is the county town of County Armagh and a city in Northern Ireland, as well as a civil parish. It is the ecclesiastical capital of Ireland – the seat of the Archbishops of Armagh, the Pri ...

. She made her debut in 2015 and won All Star honours following a series of promising performances. She won another All Star in 2017, before her progress was derailed by an

anterior cruciate ligament injury An anterior cruciate ligament injury occurs when the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) is either stretched, partially torn, or completely torn. The most common injury is a complete tear. Symptoms include pain, an audible cracking sound during inju ...

in July 2019. After a period of rehabilitation Mackin stopped playing soccer to focus on Gaelic football. Exceptional form on her return led to her winning the 2020

Personal life

Mackin attended St Paul's High School, Bessbrook and Ulster University at Jordanstown. In 2022 Mackin's sister and Armagh team-mate Bláithín signed for

AFL Women's AFL Women's (AFLW) is Australia's national semi-professional Australian rules football league for female players. The first season of the league in February and March 2017 had eight teams; the league expanded to 10 teams in the 2019 season, 1 ...

club

Melbourne Football Club The Melbourne Football Club, nicknamed the Demons, is a professional Australian rules football club that competes in the Australian Football League (AFL), the sport's elite competition. It is based in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, ...

, but Aimee decided to remain in Ireland: "I'm probably a bit of a homebird so playing Gaelic is the priority for me at the minute." At the time she was employed as a

classroom assistant A teaching assistant or teacher's aide (TA) or education assistant (EA) or team teacher (TT) is an individual who assists a teacher with instructional responsibilities. TAs include ''graduate teaching assistants'' (GTAs), who are graduate stude ...

at her alma mater St Paul's High School.

References

External links

*
Profile
at

Irish Football Association The Irish Football Association (IFA) is the governing body for association football in Northern Ireland. It organised the Ireland national football team from 1880 to 1950, which after 1954, became the Northern Ireland national football team. ...

(IFA) {{DEFAULTSORT:Mackin, Aimee 1997 births Living people Women's association footballers from Northern Ireland Northern Ireland women's international footballers Sion Swifts Ladies F.C. players Ladies' Gaelic footballers who switched code Women's association football forwards Women's Premiership (Northern Ireland) players Sportspeople from Newry Armagh ladies' Gaelic footballers People educated at St Paul's High School, Bessbrook Educators from Northern Ireland Alumni of Ulster University 21st-century educators from Northern Ireland Newry City Ladies F.C. players