Search Results for 'centre back'

Palatine, Eire Og and the Conlon Cup will form a great partnership at 3.45 on Sunday afternoon at Dr Cullen Park, when they meet in the Michael Lyng Motors Carlow senior football championship final, in a repeat of last years county final.

1. Adrian Faherty – Claregalway

The GAA has lots of quirky things in its make-up. Topics and questions that make people quiz themselves and smile and wonder aloud.

I have fond memories of the summer of 1985. The Mayo football team was managed that year by Liam O’Neill. He was an excellent manager and coach, a driven man who really wanted nothing more than a Mayo team to express themselves in a meaningful way on the national stage. The former Galway player left no stone unturned in generating a self belief in the players in order to shake off a perceived mental weakness of the Mayo team back then. He was working with the nucleus of an All- Ireland winning under-21 team that had claimed the title in 1983. We were blessed at the time with a number of great footballers, players like Willie Joe Padden, TJ Kilgallon, Martin Carney, Eugene Lavin, Frank Noone, Jimmy Burke, and Jimmy Browne to name just a few, all talented footballers that in hindsight should probably have won lots more. We lost the Connacht final in the old Pearse Stadium in 1984. I remember big Tom Byrne scoring what appeared to be a perfectly legitimate goal in the dying minutes of that game that would surely have won us the final, but for some reason the goal was disallowed by the referee Mickey Kearins, he of Sligo fame.

Palatine won their first ever minor football championship ‘A’ title at Dr Cullen Park on Saturday when they defeated reigning champions Eire Og, who were going for four titles in a row.

The Michael Lyng Motors Carlow senior football championship final, between the top two teams Palatine and Eire Og ended level 1-10 a piece on Sunday last. The game provided the passion, the spills and thrills, and all that is good in a hard-fought sporting encounter at Dr Cullen Park.

All three Kilkenny county champions negotiated their first round Leinster Championship matches last weekend, junior champion's Tullogher Rosbercon got the ball rolling in the best possible way by beating St Peregrines/Trinity Gael's of Dublin by 6 points in O'Toole Park on Saturday. Sunday saw Nowlan Park play host to a double header, intermediate champion’s Erin’s Own of Castlecomer pitted themselves against Carlow senior winners, Naomh Bríd of Old Leighlin. This game went down to the wire. The Comer men eventually came out on top by 2 points in what was described as a cracking game. The Old Leighlin men are very passionate about their hurling, they went to war last Sunday without their veteran centre back and former county and Leinster star, Johnny Nevin, who was away in Australia on over 40s duty. Nevin may be getting on, but by all accounts he still has the drive and passion to compete at the highest level. Comer's cause was helped in the first half by goals from Davy Buggy and Jimmy Byrne, they had to withstand a lot of pressure in the second half before coming out on top. Their next hurdle is Blackwater of Wexford.

Éire Óg senior footballers are still in the Leinster championship when they drew level with Colmcille of Longford after extra time in Dr Cullen Park on Sunday.

New Galway hurling manager John McIntyre has already started to ring the changes.

Both Westmeath and Roscommon Gaelic footballers return to action this weekend in the All-Ireland qualifiers eager to forget their last 70 minutes of championship action. Roscommon and Westmeath are in very similar situations with both teams suffering heavy defeats in their respective provincial semi-finals and having just two weeks to regroup and try to focus on the qualifiers. On Saturday afternoon Roscommon head for the sunny south east to take on Wexford after their 20 point defeat to Mayo, while later that evening Westmeath entertain old rivals Meath in Cusack Park in a bid to get back on the road again after their 27 point defeat to Dublin. Westmeath started out their campaign this year against Meath in early January in the O’Byrne cup. The question is come Saturday evening will Meath be Westmeath’s first and last game of 2009? Both Westmeath players and management have taken some criticism over the last few weeks. There have been many excuses given for the poor performance against Dublin - poor league campaign, constant injury crisis, and the lack of match fitness and sharpness by a number of the 15 that took the field against Dublin.