{"id":16636,"date":"2025-08-22T17:59:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-22T17:59:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/16636\/"},"modified":"2025-08-22T17:59:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-22T17:59:09","slug":"at-50-michael-connelly-becomes-oldest-garda-recruit-among-2025-graduates-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/16636\/","title":{"rendered":"At 50, Michael Connelly becomes oldest garda recruit among 2025 graduates \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michael Connolly\u2019s grandfather wanted to be a garda before his mother became ill. He went home to mind the farm and had to give up on his dream. <\/p>\n

On Friday, however, Connolly became the oldest member of the force. Now aged 50, the thought of joining An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na<\/a> was \u201calways in the back of my mind\u201d, but he too thought his chance was gone. <\/p>\n

Then an unexpected opportunity came in 2023 when the maximum recruitment age for garda\u00ed was raised from 35 to 50. \u201cI had one shot at it,\u201d said the married father of three. <\/p>\n

He had been working at a healthy living centre in Northern Ireland. He applied and was accepted into the Garda training college in Templemore<\/a>, Co Tipperary. <\/p>\n

He flew through the fitness test, as his part-time role as a League of Ireland<\/a> referee meant he had to do between three and four fitness tests a year. <\/p>\n

He has officiated at premier division, first division and women\u2019s premier division levels, experiences that will stand him in good stead in trying to maintain law and order while dealing with abuse. <\/p>\n

The maxim that garda\u00ed are told to \u201cstay calm\u201d when confronted with a dangerous situation is one he has experienced regularly in refereeing. Still, he hopes to continue officiating at the women\u2019s premier level if the time allows. <\/p>\n

Connolly is a native of Aghyaran, Co Tyrone, on the Donegal-Tyrone border and lives in Glenfin. He was stationed in Milford during his placement. <\/p>\n

\u201cI have had nine months of challenge and some great people. It\u2019s been all really good.\u201d <\/p>\n

At the other end of the age spectrum was 19-year-old Hannah Egan from Co Kildare. Her father, Det Chief Supt Ger Egan, works in the National Bureau of Criminal Investigation. Her stepmother, Louise O\u2019Neill, is a garda inspector in Kilkenny City. <\/p>\n

\"HannahHannah Egan (19) was the youngest recruit to pass out of Templemore. <\/p>\n

Egan, who says she was the youngest \u201cby far\u201d in the class of 2025, left school two years ago with the goal of joining An Garda S\u00edoch\u00e1na like her parents. <\/p>\n

\u201cI saw my dad in the job and I always wanted to do the same as him,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy father encouraged me. He loves the job and he couldn\u2019t speak highly enough about it. I hope to follow in his footsteps if I\u2019m good enough. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I left school, I knew I didn\u2019t want to do anything else. I came here as soon as I could.\u201d<\/p>\n

What advice would she give to would-be garda\u00ed? \u201cI\u2019d say come straight in. Everybody in here absolutely loves it. There is something for everyone to enjoy.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"TheThe 154 new members of the force after their attestation ceremony in Templemore. <\/p>\n

Of the 154 garda\u00ed who attested on Friday, 26 were born outside the state, from countries including Belarus, Brazil, Kazakhstan, Nigeria and the United States. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michael Connolly\u2019s grandfather wanted to be a garda before his mother became ill. He went home to mind…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16637,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[956,9,10,18,13,14,6,19,17,11,12,6435,15,16,5,7,8],"class_list":{"0":"post-16636","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-an-garda-siochana","9":"tag-breaking-news","10":"tag-breakingnews","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-featured-news","13":"tag-featurednews","14":"tag-headlines","15":"tag-ie","16":"tag-ireland","17":"tag-latest-news","18":"tag-latestnews","19":"tag-league-of-ireland","20":"tag-main-news","21":"tag-mainnews","22":"tag-news","23":"tag-top-stories","24":"tag-topstories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}