Katie McCabe and Steph Catley of Arsenal speak to the media in the flash interview mix zone after the UEFA Women's Champions League final match between Arsenal and FC Barcelona at Estadio Jose Alvalade on May 24, 2025 in Lisbon, Portugal.
Katie McCabe and Steph Catley of Arsenal speak to the media in the flash interview mix zone after the UEFA Women's Champions League final match between Arsenal and FC Barcelona at Estadio Jose Alvalade on May 24, 2025 in Lisbon, Portugal. - (Photo by Molly Darlington - UEFA/UEFA via Getty Images)
Macdara Ferris reports from Lisbon
Katie McCabe spoke on Saturday evening after winning the European Cup about her Champions League journey from playing with Raheny United in the qualifiers of the competition in 2014 through to the Tallaght woman lifting the trophy in Lisbon last Arsenal this weekend.
Over a decade ago extratime.com did a joint interview with a League of Ireland player and his younger sister who was an up-and-coming player in the women’s side of the league.
Back then Raheny player Katie McCabe was more known as the younger sister of Shamrock Rovers star and multiple league winner Gary McCabe – fast forward to 2025 and Gary McCabe is long retired from the league and he is more likely to be known now as Katie McCabe’s big brother.
The pair would celebrate together on the pitch in Lisbon after the win for the Gunners.
Champions League weekend
When her Arsenal side made the quarter-final of the Champions League this season, this extratime.comreporter had a thought about travelling to the final to cover the match should the Gunners get there. I dismissed that notion after their 2-0 first leg loss away to Real Madrid.
When the Gunners won the second leg 3-0 at the Emirates, the thought of a weekend in Lisbon resurfaced only from me to dismiss it once again when they lost 2-1 at home to European heavyweights Lyon in the semi-final first leg.
However after Arsenal went 3-0 up early in the second half of the second leg, the flights were quickly booked.
I’ve been lucky enough to attend a number Champions League finals, with my first actually being in Lisbon back in 2014. While extratime.com have covered the women’s final previously, this weekend was my first time attending this fixture.
The interesting aspects of covering this game for me was not determining what difference there might be between the men’s and women’s finals but in covering a final with genuine Irish interest (Caoimhín Kelleher was a non-playing sub in a couple of recent finals).
While it is exciting to report on the great teams and players from the men’s game, it is brilliant to report on a star of the Irish game playing on such a big stage.
For the past five or so years, I’ve regularly covered the senior Ireland women’s national team for extratime.com and during that time Katie McCabe has been a fixture in the side having been captain of the WNT since the age of 21.
With McCabe set to become the first Irish player to play in a final since John O’Shea with Manchester United in 2009, this was a big Irish football story.
Time was spent at Carla Ward’s press conference at the start of the week talking about McCabe’s achievement in making the final and throughout the week, extratime.com and other Irish media outlets had lots of Katie McCabe content.
A selection from match day included a big interview with the Tallaght woman in the Indo, a longread profile piece on the42.ie, The Irish Sun talking to her Raheny teammates from the 2014 defeat to Bristol Academy in the Champions League qualifiers and the Irish Times, amongst others, talking to the Irish players who won Arsenal’s previous European Cup back in 2007 (Emma Byrne, Yvonne Treacy and Ciara Grant).
Match day
This year was the first final that UEFA had organised a Fans Fest for the women’s final. Located in Praca do Comercio (just off Rou do Arsenal!), it had the ubiquitous massive match ball for fans to get their photo with and assorted stands from UEFA sponsors.
The venue for the final was Sporting’s Estádio José Alvalade stadium – the club would end the weekend by beating city rivals Benfica in dramatic fashion in the Portuguese Cup final played in the Estadio Nacional elsewhere in Lisbon (where Celtic won their European Cup in 1967).
Around the Sporting stadium, ahead of kick-off security was fairly light without the cordon often seen stopping fans getting too close to the venue.
It all meant plenty of people were still doing their weekly shop in Lidl while supporters of Arsenal (who had 5,000 fans as part of the club’s official party) and Barcelona (who came in greater numbers) began to file into the venue.
There was the opening ceremony ahead of kick-off which had according to UEFA a ‘concept theme of Rival-hood, a rivalry marked by mutual respect and shared passion, while remaining competitive on the field.’
There was no main artist performing in Lisbon but you can look forward to LINKIN PARK headlining the kick-off show in Munich next Saturday night.
164 participants got to wave their small and giant flags on the pitch before former Portugues players Carla Couto and Eder brought the trophy out together at the end of the ceremony.
For the game there were 65 photographers pitchside and extratime.com had one of the 93 positions in the press box (that compares with last year’s men’s final in Wembley of 153 photographers and 320 in the pressbox).
Arsenal rode their luck at times in the game but Barcelona failed to take the chances they created and firepower off the bench proved crucial with Swedish striker Stina Blackstenius coming on to fire home the winner for the Gunners (see match report here).
Mix zone
At previous finals, I’ve generally gone to the post-match press conference with the managers which the player of the match also usually attends. They have been fascinating affairs listening to managers such as Carlo Ancelotti, Zinedine Zidane, Jürgen Klopp and Pep Guardiola.
No disrespect to Renée Slegers or Pere Romeu but I skipped their pressers to hang around in the mix zone to try and catch Katie McCabe.
Unsurprisingly the Barcelona players were first to leave through the mix zone corridor that was flanked by reporters. Many of the players had pizza in their hands but Claudia Pina had the golden boot from this season’s Champions League tucked under her arm.
Everyone loves a good Champions League winners mix zone celebration and I got the chance to chat with a European champion Katie McCabe amongst it all.
Coming up later on @ExtratimeNewspic.twitter.com/0vJY0hYvIl
— Macdara Ferris (@macdarabueller) May 24, 2025
It was a long wait for the Arsenal squad who had celebrated out on the pitch with friends and family – including Gary McCabe joining his sister Katie amongst McCabe family members. About two hours after the final whistle, the dressing room door opened and the tunes began to blare out.
The Arsenal players began to come through the mix zone led by England captain Leah Williamson with goalkeeper Daphne van Domselaar clutching the 10kg 600m tall Women’s Champions League trophy behind her.
Beside me the Swedish media spoke with the match winner Stina Blackstenius, and then I was able to hear her thoughts on the winning goal.
“When it went in, my feelings were all over the place,” admitted the striker. “I was a bit in shock and then I was scared that I was offside. These are the moments that you play for and the games we all dream about.”
Katie McCabe was one of the last to leave the dressingroom and was happy to stop to talk to a familiar Irish voice in the mix zone.
She talked about taking inspiration from seeing the picture daily of the three Irish players who won the 2007 European Cup for Arsenal and how she hoped to inspire the next generation of girls to the game in Ireland.
It is about 9.30pm by the time I leave the ground rather than a usual 1.30am scramble to find a way back to the city centre that can be the case for the men’s final.
This is all the benefit of the more family friendly 5pm kick-off time, although McCabe falls foul of the final whistle coming well before the watershed with her F-bomb pitchside interview on TNT Sports.
With the early kick-off time, McCabe’s post-match reaction goes online not too late in the day with the quotes picked up in some Irish newspapers online as extratime.com is the only Irish media outlet at the match.
It has been quite the day in Lisbon and we kinda get to do it all again but without the Irish connection next weekend. See you in Munich!
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About Macdara Ferris
Macdara Ferris is a contributor since 2007 to Hoops Scene (Shamrock Rovers' match day programme) and is the co-author of two books on Shamrock Rovers - 'Tallaght Time: Shamrock Rovers 2009 to 2012' (with Karl … View Full Profile