Latest news with #All-IrelandChampionships
Belfast Telegraph
19-07-2025
- Sport
- Belfast Telegraph
Meet the top referee taking charge of his first All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Final
Cawley has come to the fore this year having officiated at a number of important matches but on Sunday week will see him face his biggest test to date. A member of the progressive Sarsfields club in Kildare, Cawley has earned a reputation as a diligent, capable whistler who allows play to flow but is quick to intercede when rough play ensues. He took charge of the All-Ireland 2024 Senior Club Championship Final and has handled a raft of inter-county Allianz League and Championship fixtures since then. Next Sunday's All-Ireland decider will be his 30th Championship game and will see him get another feather in his cap. This year's provincial and All-Ireland Championships saw the busy Cawley take charge of several games involving Ulster teams. These included the meeting of Derry and Donegal, the Ulster Final featuring Armagh against Donegal and the Louth v Monaghan, Dublin v Derry, and the All-Ireland Quarter–Final between Kerry and Armagh. In the Allianz League, he refereed matches between Kerry and Donegal, Galway and Tyrone, as well as Down and Westmeath. His umpires on Sunday next will be Dave Coady and Lee Moore (both from Ballykelly), Eoghan Fitzpatrick (Nurney) and Johnny Farrell (Rathangan). His line umpires on the day will be Monaghan's Martin McNally and Meath's David Coldrick. Cawley's appointment for the All-Ireland Football Final is another significant boost for refereeing in the country as a whole particularly as the whistlers have been strongly in the spotlight because of their administration of the new rules which have transformed Gaelic football as we know it to a certain extent.
RTÉ News
17-06-2025
- Sport
- RTÉ News
'Gaelic football owes a debt of gratitude to Kerry'
Analysis: No Kerry team has ever taken the field without belief in its ability, which is why the county has been so successful By Diarmuid O'Donovan One of my favourite stories about Kerry GAA comes from 1911. In March that year, Dr Crokes of Killarney met Mitchels of Tralee in a delayed championship game from the previous year. The game was intense and the scores were close. A dispute arose between the teams during the second half. Crokes and Kerry star, Dick Fitzgerald, led his Crokes team off the field. This turned out to be a grave error. The GAA's Central Council had recently ruled that "any team that walks off the field will forfeit the game and be subject to an automatic six-month suspension from all competition". The reality of the situation did not dawn on Crokes until it was too late. The new rule meant that Crokes would miss the 1911 County Championship, and the Crokes players, including Dick Fitzgerald, could not play for Kerry. In an effort to retrieve the situation, Fitzgerald attended a subsequent meeting of the Kerry Board where the draws for the 1911 County Championship were taking place. He pleaded for leniency and managed to persuade the Board to agree to include Crokes in the championship draw, and that they would not play their first round until late September, when the suspension had been served. To quote Fitzgerald's biographer, Tom Looney, this was "a Kerry solution to a Kerry problem!" From RTÉ Radio 1's Today with Claire Byrne, retired Dublin footballer Robbie Kelleher and historian Mark Duncan discuss the Hell for Leather – The Story of Gaelic Football series Cork became the short-term beneficiaries of all this. Waterford defeated Kerry in the Munster Championship. Cork then defeated Waterford and went on to win the All-Ireland title. It was short-term because it would be another 32 years before Cork would defeat Kerry in senior football, and 34 years before Cork won another All-Ireland title. This story sums up everything that is tangible and visible about Kerry football. It has fierce and bitter local rivalries, stubbornness, guile, cunning, a drive to never, ever make the same mistake twice and, most of all, an innate ability to overcome any difficulty or situation for the sake of football. Kerry football was slow off the mark in terms of winning All-Ireland titles. The All-Ireland Championships began in 1887, but Kerry won only one Munster Championship (1892) before the turn of the 20th century. The first All-Ireland came in 1903. That win rooted Gaelic football in the Kerry psyche, and 38 All-Ireland titles have been won since then, an average of a title almost every three years. A little more than a decade after the "Fitzgerald Solution", Kerry became the scene of some of the bitterest fighting and atrocities of the Civil War. Yet, the scars of this dark time were never allowed to intrude on the Kerry senior football team. In his book In the Name of the Game, J.J. Barrett tells the story of how Free State soldiers such as Con Brosnan and Johnny Walsh played side by side with Anti-Treaty soldiers such as John Joe Sheehy and Joe Barrett. Brosnan was an army officer and organised a pass between noon and 6.00pm on Sundays to allow Sheehy, Barrett and others to play football. This does not mean that there were not strong differences of political opinion between these men (there certainly were). What it does show is that their desire to play for Kerry could overcome these differences. Barrett captained Kerry to the 1929 All-Ireland final. When the captaincy came his way again in 1931, he organised, in the face of fierce opposition from republican elements across the county, that the captaincy would be given to his old adversary and football colleague, Brosnan. Barrett was captain again in 1932 when Kerry won its fourth consecutive title. During that time and throughout the 1930s, Kerry used their fame to tour the United States and raise funds for the building of Austin Stack Park in Tralee and Fitzgerald Stadium in Killarney (named after the Dick Fitzgerald from earlier). Kerry were fortunate to have Dr Eamonn O'Sullivan in charge of the Kerry teams from the1920s to the 1960s. He is regarded as the developer of modern team management in the GAA. His innovations, such as collective training and tactical awareness, were often the decisive contribution to Kerry All-Ireland wins. By the 1940s, Cork football was sufficiently organised to stymie Kerry's annual run through the Munster Championship. Cork won Munster titles in 1943, '45, '49, '52, '56 and '57, unprecedented success by Cork standards. Kerry's response was to win eight successive Munster championships and two All-Ireland titles between 1958 and 1965. During that run a new threat emerged for Kerry, namely Ulster football. Kerry did defeat Armagh in the 1953 All-Ireland final but lost to Derry in 1958 (semi-final) and the subsequence emergence of Down in the 1960s posed a new problem. Down beat Kerry, not just once, but in the 1960 final, the 1961 semi-final and again in the 1968 final (to this day, Kerry have never beaten Down in their five championship meetings). From RTÉ News, Michael Ryan reports from Tralee as Kerry bring Sam Maguire back to the Kingdom in 1985 The Ulster question went away for the remainder of the 20th century and Kerry tacked on 11 more All-Ireland titles between 1969 and 1999. This included the four-in-a-row between 1978 to 1981 and a controversial loss to Offaly in 1982. Ulster teams have re-emerged this century however, in the form of Armagh (who beat Kerry in the 2002 final), Tyrone (beginning in 2003 semi-final and several more times since), and Donegal (2012 QF). The restructuring of the All-Ireland championships since 2001 and the introduction of various forms of All-Ireland qualifiers has meant Kerry are no longer subject to a knockout blow from Cork, or the occasional ambush from Waterford or Tipperary, as happened in 1911, 1928 or 1957. This has helped rather than hindered the Kerry insatiable quest for All-Ireland titles. Kerry have lifted the Sam Maguire cup seven times since 2000. That's an average of one every 3.5 years; a rate almost as good as the success rate since the first title in 1903. It is a success rate achieved in spite of ongoing issues with Ulster football, and Dublin's nine All-Ireland titles between 2011 and 2023 (Kerry lost to Dublin in four of these finals). From RTÉ Archives, a 1984 edition of The Sunday Game looks at Kerry football dominance including two four in a row All Ireland title wins from 1929 to 1932 and 1978 to 1982 Gaelic football owes a debt of gratitude to Kerry. The county had shown the ability to surmount civil unrest, economic depression, emigration, the intense rivalry of its internal inter-club competitions and the intense efforts of almost every other county to defeat them. No Kerry team has ever taken the field without belief in its ability, and the intention to do everything possible to win the game. That is ultimately why Kerry has been so successful. That is why, as a football fan I love them and, as a Corkman, I have very mixed emotions.
Irish Examiner
23-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Examiner
The struggle and spirit of Irish sprinters: ‘The lads are living off absolute scraps'
For Sophie Becker, the choice was straightforward. It was up to Gerard O'Donnell as her coach to spell it out: Go to Bali or invest in your sporting future. Spikes over sunsets. The Leitrim native knows what it is like to have next to nothing. He spent his first few years training in Dublin on social welfare and flat broke. His Carrick-on-Shannon childhood initially consisted of running on the road. Stick that athletics club into Google Maps and nothing appears. They have no home. Once during the Celtic Tiger, a credit card company came to town and developed a park. Their winding, gravel-filled path was soon consistently occupied by dog-walkers and O'Donnell practicing hurdles. The only time he put his foot into spikes and onto a track was for the Connacht or All-Ireland Championships. His first time in Santry was earth-shattering. An indoor area to warm up? What a wonder. He knows hardship. He knows how to get through it too. 'The athlete I work with now can achieve much greater things than I did and have already,' he says, revelling in the Dublin sunshine. What is a simple pleasure for most is an occupational gift for them. 'I don't see why they would do anything different. You have more talent, more opportunity, why put roadblocks in your own way if you can afford not to do it? I remember when Sophie first got her relay funding a few years ago. She was working full-time in Pfizer at the time and I was encouraging her to go to four days a week if it was an option. 'Then she got her funding and the next day we had a conversation. 'You know what that money is? That means you can work one day less a week, rather than going to Bali this summer.' She was like, 'I was literally looking up flights to Bali.' 'I just kept saying, 'That is a fifth of your wage or more. You can take every Friday off work now.' The next week she did exactly that. She made that decision and it paid off right away. Six months later, she went down to three days a week and now she is a full-time athlete because she can now afford to do it and she saw the benefit. 'Every Friday she had services provided in Sport Ireland; Friday she is with her physio, nutritionist, sports psychologist. Now that is a very good use of your day rather than sitting in the office for another eight hours.' O'Donnell is a high performance athletics coach, specialising in sprints and hurdles. He has recently returned from the World Relays in China where he was the head coach of the 4x400m relay teams. A seven-time national 100m hurdle champion, he can still remember looking at renowned coaches during meets and wondering if they missed competing. Now he realises one is tied to the other. Take a warm-up. As an athlete, he became incredibly rigid and diligent. The warm-up was his bible. He learned the hard way. Each injury forced him to reconsider every component of his plan. He ran it meticulously. This was one of the reasons Jeremy Lyons asked him to move from athlete to coach in the Dublin Sprint group, which now includes Olympians Sophie Becker, Cillín Greene and Jack Raftery. They are part of a recent sprint boom. At the bedrock is a dramatic improvement in facilities and funding. Tracks are popping up all over the country. Beyond that, indoor facilities in Athlone and Nenagh have been a godsend. Think about it this way: What does a kid want to do? Run fast. They don't need endless reps and endurance. Go out. Go as hard as they can in a safe, dry hub. O'Donnell didn't have such luxuries. Thankfully. 'It is frustrating in a way, but as a coach I'm more creative because of what we dealt with. What I mean is if we rock up to a track with no shelter, no toilets, no anything, it is pissing rain, everyone is wondering how do we get a warm-up done and I'm used to it. 'I know how you can get strong and fast with good basics. So hop on a track and you can fly. That is easy. How do we do the work without the track? During lockdown I was like, this is fine. 'I was probably under-trained throughout my teenage years. I wasn't hitting max velocity in training because you couldn't on the road in trainers. You are not on the track in spikes with a tail wind. 'But I know lads that were a year younger than me, you go to a competition and they beat you, you think they are just super talented. In one case, years later I was chatting to him and he was telling me his dad had them basically on a training camp all year long. He was reading Ben Johnson's training logs. 'He had his 13-year-olds doing plyos down the central reservation of a motorway while they were on holidays in France. I was running twice a week and a bit of high jumps. It got me thinking, maybe talent wasn't the factor here. But he doesn't make it past 20 in the sport and I didn't win my first national senior title until I'm 26. Which would I trade for? I'd definitely take what I got out of it.' They have it good. In Guangzhou, the women's 4x400m relay team and the mixed team secured qualification for the World Championships. The women's foursome featured three of the team that finished fourth in the Paris Olympics last summer. Becker opens her individual season in Brussels this weekend. It could be better. There is an urgent need for more indoor tracks. The funding increase is yet to substantially impact coaches. Sport Ireland's recent funding allocation continued the trajectory of investing significantly in high-performance sport. It can also function as a reward for performance, rather than rewarding future success. Take Cillín Greene and Jack Raftery. Both Olympians. Both in the top 10 for the all-time 400ms. 'The lads are living off absolute scraps. They got more funding this year because the relays did well last year, but Jack is in college and Cillín is working part-time because they have no other option.' Part of the problem is the lack of different revenue streams. Others can skip around the country and pocket some prize money from a local 5km. That option doesn't exist for sprinters. 'The stress of money kills athletes. They are constantly scraping and scrimping. I need to book that flight for 6am, because it is €200 and the other one is €400. It completely impacts my performance but I can't afford to book the comfortable one. I know one lad, if you gave him 100k this year, he'd break the national record. The money he is on now means he will run this time. 'It is going up and getting better, because lads are running better. Which is funny, it arrives after you really need it. Suffer through and then it starts to come.' Imagine the position this puts coaches in. They know their athletes have little money and the impact it has on their performance. They have to survive as well. There is a Sport Ireland stipend for coaching that is divvied out by Athletics Ireland. Last year, Dublin Sprint received €10,000. At the time, they had three coaches. It might cover the cost of one camp abroad. This season, they returned to training in October and funding is yet to materialise. Gerard O Donnell of Carrick-on-Shannon AC, Leitrim, Matthew Behan of Crusaders AC, Dublin, and David Dagg of Dundrum South Dublin AC, Dublin, on the podium after the mens 110m hurdle final at the Irish Life Health National Senior Track and Field Championships 2022 at Morton Stadium. Pic: Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile One possible solution is to add a separate fund to athlete funding dedicated solely to coaching. Of course, there is more to this rich spell than money. Trace the roots of this hot streak. A spark. Suitable soil to ignite it. A trailblazer. For his group, it was Cork's Phil Healy. In the early days, that was their mantra. Be like Phil. 'Phil was the benchmark for so many years. 'Phil is able to do it.' She is super talented and a national record holder but it was always, 'Look what she is doing.' Phil was the hero for our whole group. She is gritting it out with Shane McCormack down in Cork or Waterford, not off in Florida or Tenerife. 'She is amazing. Competing at international level since 2014, from 60m up to 400m. She just gets out and gets it done. Why can't we have that attitude? Sophie went down and did sessions with Phil, got her ass handed to her. It was literally, someday I can get close to Phil.' Dublin Sprint continues to go from strength to strength. They are not affiliated to any club. It has all the benefits of team sport, training partners to share encouragement and the workload, without any obligations to take in more members. This team is carefully constructed, piece by piece, to suit themselves. Some of them are Olympians. Some have a good attitude and a car to take others to training. Everyone has to make it work. That's the culture. In Irish athletics, optimism is not so much a feeling as an act of faith. 'Part of it is you don't want to show people the skeletons in the closet. There is enough griping and negativity around the place. So it can seem like, fake it until you make it. Let everyone think it's great and maybe it becomes great. Sponsors, backers, the general public come on board. But also, we need our athletes to think a certain way too. 'They need to think, 'this is the best setup for me right now. If I was in Florida or Spain, the weather is better, but I wouldn't have my family close by. I wouldn't have access to same quality coach and physios. Would I be happy?' They need to be in the mindset that this is the best for me. I have given myself the best chance to succeed. It's about putting yourself in the situation that will get the best out of you. 'It's not 'why am I in Dublin instead of America where they have this and that?' It is 'why would I want to be anywhere else?' If you are not happy with the setup you have created, you are going nowhere.'
The Irish Sun
22-05-2025
- Politics
- The Irish Sun
Skorts saga comes to an end as Camogie Association votes overwhelmingly in favour of letting players wear shorts
CAMOGIE chiefs have voted in favour of allowing players to wear either shorts or skorts with immediate effect after recent protests. At tonight's Special Congress, 98 per cent of delegates voted in support of giving players choice. 1 Camogie players will have a choice between shorts and skorts Credit: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile Camogie Association President Brian Molloy said: 'We are pleased to announce that delegates have voted by an overwhelming majority in favour of giving players greater choice in their playing attire. 'From midnight tonight, each individual player will have the option to wear skorts or shorts - adding choice while maintaining the professionalism and uniformity of our team kits in both colour and design. 'I want to sincerely thank our incredible volunteers for their ongoing support over the last few weeks, and to our delegates for voting on behalf of over 120,000 members, including 94,000 playing members. 'As the All-Ireland Championships begin this weekend, we ask everyone to support their teams, drive higher attendances at all upcoming games, and help us fill Croke Park for the finals on August 10th.' Read More on Camogie It brings to an end a controversy that has dogged camogie and has seen player-led protests against the hugely unpopular use of skorts. Reacting to the vote, the GPA said: 'We welcome the result of this evening's vote for choice at the Camogie Association Special Congress. 'The GPA would like to put on the record our admiration for camogie players across Ireland and beyond, both at inter-county and club level, who made their voices heard to ensure this outcome. 'To our own membership who have led the campaign for choice, we salute your willingness to stand up for both yourselves, and future generations of camogie players. Most read in GAA Hurling 'We thank the delegates who listened to players' call for choice. 'The last few weeks have once again shown the necessity of putting players at the heart of decision making within Gaelic games.' Dublin and Kilkenny camogie players wear shorts in protest against skorts While contentious for years, the issue came to a head at the start of May when the Leinster semi-final between Dublin and Kilkenny was nearly called off. Both teams came together to protest skorts by wearing shorts for the game, only to be told by the referee that the game would be abandoned if they did not change. The fall-out from that controversy was swift. Cork and Waterford both declared that they would wear shorts for the Munster senior final, which was eventually called off on 16 hours notice. This outcry led to a change in approach from the Camogie Association. In 2024, motions seeking to give players choice failed to amass the 66 per cent support required to pass. The issue was not due for another vote until 2027, only for the recent row to force chiefs to bring the vote forward to Thursday night.
Irish Daily Mirror
22-05-2025
- Sport
- Irish Daily Mirror
Motion passed to allow Camogie players wear shorts instead of skorts
Delegates have passed a motion that will allow Camogie players to wear shorts instead of the traditional skort as part of their matchday kit. Uachtarán Brian Molloy said this evening: "We are pleased to announce that delegates have voted by an overwhelming majority in favour of giving players greater choice in their playing attire. From midnight tonight, each individual player will have the option to wear skorts or shorts - adding choice while maintaining the professionalism and uniformity of our team kits in both colour and design. "I want to sincerely thank our incredible volunteers for their ongoing support over the last few weeks, and to our delegates for voting on behalf of over 120,000 members, including 94,000 playing members. "As the All-Ireland Championships begin this weekend, we ask everyone to support their teams, drive higher attendances at all upcoming games, and help us fill Croke Park for the finals on August 10th." The issue came to a head earlier this Summer when a string of teams wore shorts during their warmups as a protest against the rules. When Waterford and Cork signalled their intent to wear shorts for the Munster final, the game was cancelled on short notice. Last weekend's Leinster final went ahead, with Kilkenny and Dublin playing the game 'under protest.' The passing of the motion will be a great relief for players, many of whom have expressed their displeasure at wearing skorts, calling them uncomfortable and unfit for purpose in a recent survey of camogie players.
