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RTÉ News
16-07-2025
- Sport
- RTÉ News
Armagh's Ethan Rafferty takes to road for All-Ireland glory in 2025
Had things gone according to plan, Ethan Rafferty would have been involved last weekend in the All-Ireland football championship semi-finals. The reigning champions looked on course during the early stages of their last-eight clash with Kerry, before the Kingdom hit the overdrive button to dethrone the Sam Maguire holders. One silver lining is that the exit allowed the 31-year-old switch sporting focus to his other passion, road bowling. While one All-Ireland dream was gone, on Sunday he realised another. The Grange clubman took the All-Ireland senior road bowls title in west Cork, defeating Arthur McDonagh to become the first bowler to win intermediate and senior titles in successive years. 🏆Ethan Rafferty, All-Ireland Road Bowls Champion 🟠⚪️👏👏 🗣️"One down, one to go" 💪 Congratulations Ethan 🤜🤛 — Armagh_GAA (@Armagh_GAA) July 14, 2024 It marks something of a family monopoly on the Hughie Traynor Cup as he succeeds his brother Colm as champion, while the previous two editions were won by first cousin Thomas Mackle. Last year Rafferty's aunt, Dervla Toal-Mallon, took the senior women's crown. To the uninitiated, road bowls – or bullets as it is known in Armagh – is a sport where competitors throw a solid metal ball (Rafferty and McDonagh were throwing a 28-ounce bowl) along snaking country roads in the fewest shots. "It's the same concept as golf," says Gretta Cormican, a key figure in Ból Chumann na hÉireann (Irish Road Bowling Association). "You go from A to B in the least amount of shots. There is a start and finish line and it is usually over a distance of around a mile and half for the senior final." Once a popular sport right across Ireland, road bowling is played primarily in Cork and Armagh, and Cormican, the 1998 women's world champion and seven-time All-Ireland winner, outlines distinct styles between the two counties. "The Cork style is to swing your arm right around. The Armagh boys don't swing the arm, they run full holly into it, jump and release the bowl underhand." While McDonagh had to negotiate four matches to emerge from Cork (known as the Munster championship), Armagh currently only has three senior bowlers. With Mackle injured, it was a best of three Ulster decider for the Rafferty brothers. "It was awkward enough, yet enjoyable at the same time," Rafferty says. "I'd consider Colm a better player than me. He was in good form, but I nipped him in Ulster. It was good craic, but as soon as it starts, you want to win." Last year he claimed the intermediate title the day after lowering Kerry colours in the All-Ireland football semi-final. The Kingdom's revenge mission in Croke Park a fortnight ago allowed him to fully commit to targeting a senior crown. The lead-up wasn't overly intense, a couple of evenings hitting the local roads with friends and father Peter. A half an hour here and there, often before club training with Grange "to keep the eye in". His family and friends made the trek south to Castletownkenneigh in west Cork to see if the silverware would remain in the Orchard County, joining the huge crowds gathered roadside for the seven events down for decision (the All-Ireland series is broken into three series, with each series hosting seven grades). Rafferty wasn't the only recognisable GAA face. In the women's intermediate final, Armagh camogie captain Gemma McCann beat decorated former Cork footballer captain Juliet Murphy with the last throw. Rafferty's final was a little more comfortable. Leading from start to finish, his first two bowls paved the way for victory. McDonagh's late rally was in vein, Rafferty producing a scintillating last shot to keep his lead over a bowl. "I knew I had got him at arm's reach," he said. "When I went a shot up, I knew I just had to keep beating his mark. "You have to be shrewd, talk yourself down and keep throwing your shots. Keeping a level head in vital." As the celebrations continued in Clonakilty, the messages came in thick and fast, Armagh team-mates among those to congratulate the new champion. "Some of them would never have heard of it before, sometimes I would be explaining it," he said. Doing well last year, more of the lads picked up on it from that "I always say I must get a bit of a gathering of the boys to throw for charity and have a bit of craic." Earlier in the year the roving keeper admitted he wasn't sure if he would be in a position to continue road bowls at such a high level. He and his partner Danielle are due to welcome a baby in the next four weeks, so his schedule will have even less openings. Can he see himself defending his title? "I don't know. We'll see. If I can fit it in, I'll try my best. Bullets is a good release from football. It's a different element of focus."
Irish Examiner
16-07-2025
- Sport
- Irish Examiner
Different ball game but road bowling a family affair for Armagh netminder Ethan Rafferty
Ethan Rafferty achieved a unique addition to his All-Ireland football medal won last year when claiming the All-Ireland senior road bowling crown over the weekend. The latter success, though, is no way unique to his family. Sunday's win merely lifts him onto the bottom step of a family ladder steeped in road bowling silverware. After victory on the west Cork roads around Castletownkenneigh, there's little doubt that road bowling must carry a significant degree of importance to him if he is making the time to operate to such a high level in tandem with his existence within the consuming inter-county sphere. 'It's real family-oriented for myself,' he says, before dropping in the mightily impressive stat that his win keeps the senior men's title in the family for a fourth successive year. 'My grandfather, Aidan Toal, was big into it and that filtered down. His son, Michael Toal, has ten All-Ireland titles, and then there's all the cousins and we would've played together growing up. 'I won it this year, my younger brother Colm won the Senior All-Ireland last year, and then the two years before that was a first cousin of ours, Thomas Mackle, so it's obviously close to your heart because it's your family. My auntie Dervla [Toal], she's a reigning All-Ireland Ladies champion too, so I would be rightfully down the pecking order with regards to All-Irelands in the family. THROUGH THE MILLING CROWDS: Armagh's Ethan Rafferty - better known as the county's No 1 - contesting (and winning) the All-Ireland Senior Road Bowling Championships at Castletownkenneigh in Co Cork. This decisive moment, brilliantly captured by Greta Cormican, is his throw from 'The Black Gate' to 'Fehilly's Lane' and was critical in ensuring Rafferty went out to Forshin's Cross in one more. That and his following throw made it virtually impossible for final opponent Arthur McDonagh to mount a successful comeback. Pic: Greta Cormican 'All my uncles, aunties, mum and dad, and all came down to the score on Sunday, it means a lot, so you try and find time for it the best you can, you get out for 10 or 15 minutes practice, and that's how you keep tipping at it.' The journey down from Armagh was made on Saturday with only one stop, that to take in Tyrone and the Orchard County's quarter-final conquerors Kerry. The two-mile course was walked that evening to have its curvature sampled and studied, Ethan and his dad enjoying the road to themselves in sharp contrast to the throngs that packed the following day. 'It was a civil enough score Sunday, but the crowds can be heated because you'd have fellas there wagering a lot on it, so they're obviously looking to get the win. 'With the large crowd, it can be hard to navigate the road and ask them to get out of the way, but before each shot they are good, if you want to look up the left-hand side of the road, they'll clear that side. 'I have an uncle, a cousin, and a friend in my camp so to speak, so I would leave it up to them, they can read the road a bit better than I would. You're sort of going off what they are telling you.' Two weeks after Kerry dismantled his kickout and dethroned Armagh in the process, Sunday was a timely triumph. 'With the football going on, I wasn't sure if I was going to get playing the bullets at all this year. Obviously the season ended prematurely for us, and so this was something I could put my head into and focus on after the football. 'I didn't expect to be competing for the senior All-Ireland title this year, after only winning the intermediate last year, but I gave it my best and thankfully it worked out.'
Irish Times
29-06-2025
- Sport
- Irish Times
Kerry's Jack O'Connor: ‘A few pundits down our way let themselves down'
Jack O'Connor lives for this stuff. A Kerry team coming to Croke Park as underdogs. A Kerry public doubting, questioning, whispering in corners. The sun in the sky and the ball in the air and a point to prove. And prove. And prove again. This is Jack's bailiwick. He's won four All-Irelands in three different stints as Kerry manager. He's been involved in Kerry teams at various levels since 1992 and has overseen incredible success and glory days. And still he never seems more at home than when he has a pebble in his shoe and his nose out of joint. Kerry didn't so much beat Armagh here as ransack their souls. It's grand being All-Ireland champions until someone gets a run on you. That's when you find out who you are and what you have. Kerry kicked 14 points on the bounce in a quarter of an hour and Armagh's defence of Sam Maguire lay in ashes. Who predicted it? Not many. And if they did, they weren't talking about it landing with such a thump and a bang. Ethan Rafferty has spent the summer getting bigged up as the ultimate kick-out ninja, able to change his mind at will and still land the ball on a sprinkler head. Kerry won 11 out of 14 of his kick-outs in that spell and sped off into the distance with them. READ MORE And so Jack came in to talk to the media afterwards, in the mood to kick some ass and take some names. The GAA press people warned us to put the camera phones away, apparently because 'Jack doesn't like being filmed.' If it made him speak freer, so much the better. He definitely didn't spare the rod anyway. 'I don't think too many people outside the camp saw that performance there,' he said. 'But we were very, very determined. There was ferocious determination in the camp that we weren't going to let the season fizzle out after the Meath game. It may have been difficult for Armagh not to listen to the outside noise where we were being written off and they were being written up.' Kerry man of the match Seán O'Shea celebrates a point with David Clifford. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho Was it fuelled by hurt, Jack? 'Look, one of the great motivators in life is trying to prove people wrong. We were being portrayed as a one-man team. I saw somebody writing this morning that said the only Kerry player worthy of being called a Kerry player was David Clifford. Now, David is a great player but David will tell you that there was a fair supporting cast there today. 'We think we have a lot of good footballers but I think sometimes we're being judged on different criteria to other teams. For example, Dublin got beaten by Meath in the Leinster Championship and I didn't see any ex-Dublin players coming out slating the team or slating the management like we had down south in our county. There's a sense of commitment to the team and a sense of loyalty to the team. Unfortunately a few pundits down our way let themselves down in that regard.' Jack was on a roll now, a righteous mixture of hurt and defiance. He didn't spell out who he was talking about but you didn't need an AI search bot to make a decent guess. The only-player-worthy line was from Joe Brolly in the Sindo. The few-pundits-down-our-way is a bit broader to parse but one of them is fairly certain to be Darragh Ó Sé in The Irish Times. Even if one man's slating is another's genuine reflection on the mood of the county , all nuance is torpedoed at a time like this. When your team turns expectations on their head, those are the spoils of victory. A scutching of the All-Ireland champions makes things very simple. You Da Man. Everyone else can sit and listen for a minute. Armagh's Barry McCambridge and Andrew Murnin look to stop Brian Ó Beaglaoich of Kerry. Photograph: James Crombie/Inpho 'I'm not giving out from my own point of view,' O'Connor went on. 'I'm just saying. I just gave the example. I never hear Dublin players slating the team. They're loyal to the group. They're loyal to the county. They give their support. 'What's to be gained by slating people? It's the easiest thing in the world. I'm in the business of building people up. I'm not in the business of knocking people. I spent all my life coaching underage, schools, minors, under-21s, seniors – every level. I'm in the business of building people, not knocking people. 'I ask people that are knocking the group and knocking people that are involved in the group – look in the mirror and ask what have you contributed? What have you contributed to Kerry football off the field? You know what I mean? It's very easy to knock people. That's how you help Kerry football. Not knocking people.' And with that, he was up and away, his jaw set and his walk full of purpose. Five minutes later, the word came through that they have Tyrone in the semi-final. Jack is a veteran of that bailiwick too. He won't be shy about Kerry's ability to prosper in it. Not after this.
The 42
29-06-2025
- Sport
- The 42
Kerry knock Armagh off their perch as they dump champions out of race for Sam
Kerry 0-5-21 (32) Armagh 1-4-13 (21) KERRY HAVE DETHRONED All-Ireland champions Armagh in a devastating third quarter in their quarter-final meeting. The Kingdom looked be in serious bother after the break when four points after put the champions in a commanding position with a margin of five. But Kerry then produced an ultra-aggressive kickout press on Armagh's goalkeeper Ethan Rafferty, winning all the clean possession and the breaks and forcing him over the sideline in a fifteen-minute spell when they went from 0-14 to 0-30, helped on the way by Sean O'Shea and David Clifford turning on masterful performances. The introduction of Paudie Clifford at the break brought class, while Micheál Burns was barely on the pitch before he had his first score and his energy pinned the Armagh defence back. Advertisement Armagh had looked the better side up until Kerry's astonishing revival, capped by a brilliant Rory Grugan goal after Tiernan Kelly was alive to a short kickout that was botched between Shane Ryan and Dylan Casey. more to follow….
Irish Daily Mirror
28-05-2025
- Sport
- Irish Daily Mirror
Derry-Galway TV info, throw-in time, date & more for All-Ireland football clash
A resurgent Derry host Galway in Group 4 of the All-Ireland round robins. The Group of Death sees these two teams joined by Dublin and Armagh, with all four sides in realistic contention for Sam Maguire. The teams previously met in the third round of this year's league, and drew 0-16 to 1-13 in Derry. Derry were perhaps unlucky to lose by as wide a margin as they did to Armagh, with Ethan Rafferty making a few fine stops to prevent a Oak Leaf comeback. The Tribesmen will feel aggrieved that they failed to win in Salthill against the Dubs, and need to start putting points on the board soon. Here's what you need to know about the big game: Sunday, June 1. Celtic Park in Derry. The game is due to begin at 2pm. No, the game is not being shown on TV, but it is being streamed on GAA+. Derry - 13/5 Draw - 15/2 Galway - 4/11
