Like so many defenders who tried and failed to contain her during an 18-year inter-county career, it’s impossible to put Niamh Kindlon into a single box.
Liam Neeson and his “very particular set of skills” in the film Taken pale next to the former Monaghan star’s talents. In the week of the Women & Agriculture conference, it might be necessary to create a fringe event for the Magheracloone native, from agriculture to plumbing and panel-beating and, of course, the lifetime’s service to club and county.
Getting on with things and making the best of a situation is part of the Kindlon make-up. Niamh and her siblings grew up on a sheep and dairy farm but, around the turn of the millennium – and just after the installation of new equipment – a TB test drastically reduced her father Maurice’s herd.
“Obviously, being very heavily involved in football, being a dairy farmer wasn’t really the ideal job for him,” Niamh says.
“He was involved with coaching as well at all levels, with the boys and the girls, and I was playing county at the time and they were travelling down the country, coming to games with me and then having to fly home [for milking].
“Maybe it was just meant to be. The dairy sort of lay idle for a while and we changed things around and he went into sucklers then.”
As Niamh puts it, when she left school she didn’t want to be sitting in an office all day and preferred to be doing something with her hands.
“A friend of a friend had a garage and he basically said – ‘Do you want to come down?’” she says.
“I had never thought about panel-beating but he basically asked if I wanted to try it out and the rest is history.”
By that stage, Niamh was well-established on the Monaghan team, having made her debut in 1997, helping the county to win a second successive senior All-Ireland.
While the Brendan Martin Cup has yet to make it back to the Farney County, Niamh did play in four more All-Ireland finals and earned three All-Star Awards. Farming and football went hand in hand.
“Margaret Kierans, the captain of the team in 1996, she was a farmer,” Niamh says.
“She’s from a place called Aghabog and, if you ever went up there, her farm and her house are on the way up to the pitch.
“I can remember heading up there to play them in club games, you’d pass and see her on the tractor and you’d be like, ‘Oh yes, she’s not going to be there today!’ and the next thing, she’d land right down, through the ditch almost, throw on a pair of boots and play.”
Niamh Kindlon Monaghan celebrates after a game.\ Paul Mohan/Sportsfile
Panel-beating to plumbing
Such is the way of life when one grows up on a farm. Continuing to help out at home, Niamh added another string to her bow when she pivoted from panel-beating to plumbing, joining the business set up by her brother Donal and uncle Dermot as their order-book grew to such levels that another body was required.
That remains the day-job and Niamh’s other brother Fintan is also a plumber – “But there’s probably a load of leaky taps around at home, you never get the chance to fix your own stuff,” she says, laughing.
In October 2021, Maurice – a healthy and active man up to then – suffered seizures leading to a cardiac arrest and, while he overcame that, another episode in the summer of 2022 forced him to take a step back from farming.
Donal and Fintan took over the suckler side of the operation while Niamh and her sister Fiona tended to the sheep. Used to working together as joint-managers for various Magheracloone club teams, they put in place a couple of ‘tactical alterations’.
“Dad used to have the lambing around Christmas, when we’d be around to help,” she says, “but we ended up getting a teaser ram and we sort of changed the world around a wee bit that would suit us, that we’d have them down in March and have them lambing within 10 days.
“We could take a week off work and be there for the lambing and, with the weather better – potentially – we’d be letting them out pretty soon then, so it’d be less sort of work for Christmas.”
Family business
When it’s a family business and a lifelong passion, the duties never cease but, equally, a collective effort gets the job done in the end.
“My mother Anne, she’s a brilliant help,” Niamh says, “because we’re still heavily involved in football – me and my sister are in charge of the Magheracloone senior team at the minute and that has its own commitments.
“Dad didn’t have cameras – he used to get up in the middle of the night – he didn’t even set an alarm – and head down to the tunnel and check them.
“We said that we needed cameras and so now, you could be at a match and checking the cameras and saying you needed to go – not mid-game, obviously, but no time for talking after.
“We’d be bombing up the road and my mam and my dad might be in the shed already waiting, having the sheep in a pen, and we’re coming in the door with our football gear on.
“We love doing this, it’s something we’ve grown up doing and we enjoy it. We’re very passionate about football and we grew up on it, but we also grew up in a farm life, so it’s very important to us too.”
And there it is folks: farming and football, always hand in hand, still standing strong.
Like so many defenders who tried and failed to contain her during an 18-year inter-county career, it’s impossible to put Niamh Kindlon into a single box.
Liam Neeson and his “very particular set of skills” in the film Taken pale next to the former Monaghan star’s talents. In the week of the Women & Agriculture conference, it might be necessary to create a fringe event for the Magheracloone native, from agriculture to plumbing and panel-beating and, of course, the lifetime’s service to club and county.
Getting on with things and making the best of a situation is part of the Kindlon make-up. Niamh and her siblings grew up on a sheep and dairy farm but, around the turn of the millennium – and just after the installation of new equipment – a TB test drastically reduced her father Maurice’s herd.
“Obviously, being very heavily involved in football, being a dairy farmer wasn’t really the ideal job for him,” Niamh says.
“He was involved with coaching as well at all levels, with the boys and the girls, and I was playing county at the time and they were travelling down the country, coming to games with me and then having to fly home [for milking].
“Maybe it was just meant to be. The dairy sort of lay idle for a while and we changed things around and he went into sucklers then.”
As Niamh puts it, when she left school she didn’t want to be sitting in an office all day and preferred to be doing something with her hands.
“A friend of a friend had a garage and he basically said – ‘Do you want to come down?’” she says.
“I had never thought about panel-beating but he basically asked if I wanted to try it out and the rest is history.”
By that stage, Niamh was well-established on the Monaghan team, having made her debut in 1997, helping the county to win a second successive senior All-Ireland.
While the Brendan Martin Cup has yet to make it back to the Farney County, Niamh did play in four more All-Ireland finals and earned three All-Star Awards. Farming and football went hand in hand.
“Margaret Kierans, the captain of the team in 1996, she was a farmer,” Niamh says.
“She’s from a place called Aghabog and, if you ever went up there, her farm and her house are on the way up to the pitch.
“I can remember heading up there to play them in club games, you’d pass and see her on the tractor and you’d be like, ‘Oh yes, she’s not going to be there today!’ and the next thing, she’d land right down, through the ditch almost, throw on a pair of boots and play.”
Niamh Kindlon Monaghan celebrates after a game.\ Paul Mohan/Sportsfile
Panel-beating to plumbing
Such is the way of life when one grows up on a farm. Continuing to help out at home, Niamh added another string to her bow when she pivoted from panel-beating to plumbing, joining the business set up by her brother Donal and uncle Dermot as their order-book grew to such levels that another body was required.
That remains the day-job and Niamh’s other brother Fintan is also a plumber – “But there’s probably a load of leaky taps around at home, you never get the chance to fix your own stuff,” she says, laughing.
In October 2021, Maurice – a healthy and active man up to then – suffered seizures leading to a cardiac arrest and, while he overcame that, another episode in the summer of 2022 forced him to take a step back from farming.
Donal and Fintan took over the suckler side of the operation while Niamh and her sister Fiona tended to the sheep. Used to working together as joint-managers for various Magheracloone club teams, they put in place a couple of ‘tactical alterations’.
“Dad used to have the lambing around Christmas, when we’d be around to help,” she says, “but we ended up getting a teaser ram and we sort of changed the world around a wee bit that would suit us, that we’d have them down in March and have them lambing within 10 days.
“We could take a week off work and be there for the lambing and, with the weather better – potentially – we’d be letting them out pretty soon then, so it’d be less sort of work for Christmas.”
Family business
When it’s a family business and a lifelong passion, the duties never cease but, equally, a collective effort gets the job done in the end.
“My mother Anne, she’s a brilliant help,” Niamh says, “because we’re still heavily involved in football – me and my sister are in charge of the Magheracloone senior team at the minute and that has its own commitments.
“Dad didn’t have cameras – he used to get up in the middle of the night – he didn’t even set an alarm – and head down to the tunnel and check them.
“We said that we needed cameras and so now, you could be at a match and checking the cameras and saying you needed to go – not mid-game, obviously, but no time for talking after.
“We’d be bombing up the road and my mam and my dad might be in the shed already waiting, having the sheep in a pen, and we’re coming in the door with our football gear on.
“We love doing this, it’s something we’ve grown up doing and we enjoy it. We’re very passionate about football and we grew up on it, but we also grew up in a farm life, so it’s very important to us too.”
And there it is folks: farming and football, always hand in hand, still standing strong.
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