It wasn’t the most fruitful of season-opening weekends for Republic of Ireland players in England’s top flight with just four of the 11 in the WSL starting for their clubs – Chelsea’s Katie McCabe, Brighton’s Caitlin Hayes, and goalkeepers Courtney Brosnan (Everton) and Sophie Whitehouse (Charlton). But Abbie Larkin won’t forget it in a hurry.
Two seasons ago she was a member of the Crystal Palace side that won just two of their 22 WSL games en route to relegation. They’re already half way to matching that tally this time around after beating Everton 1-0 in their first game back in the WSL since promotion.
Larkin only came on for the last half hour of the game, but that gave her the distinction of being the sole Republic of Ireland player who got game-time over the weekend to finish up on the winning side.
Having impressed for Ireland in their World Cup qualifying campaign, which resumes next month with a play-off against Kazakhstan, the challenge now for the 21-year-old is to get regular playing time with Palace after a fine season for them in WSL2.
Champions Manchester City opened the defence of their title with a 3-1 win over Birmingham – Arsenal, Spurs and London City Lionesses getting off to winning starts too, against Brighton, West Ham and Manchester United, respectively. McCabe’s Chelsea were held to a draw by Aston Villa, while Charlton’s return to the top tier after an 18-year gap ended in a sobering 4-0 defeat by Liverpool. It would have been worse but for some fines saves by Whitehouse.
Those Katie Keane full-time scenes 😍 pic.twitter.com/F09CR5amlY
— LCFC Women (@LCFC_Women) September 6, 2026
In WSL2, it was a good day for Leicester City’s Irish contingent, Katie Keane keeping a clean sheet in their win over Sheffield United, Jessie Stapleton and Jess Ziu making their debuts and Heather Payne coming off the bench. Leanne Kiernan was a debutante too for Newcastle in their 2-0 defeat of Wolves, Aoife Mannion contributing to that clean sheet.
And in Scotland, Kelly Brady made it four goals in as many games for Glasgow City in their 2-2 draw with Hibernian, the former Athlone Town striker finding her scoring touch again after an unproductive six months with Crystal Palace.