NOT a good week for Clare football. First off, Cusack Park was the only county grounds in Ireland that wasn’t able to stage the opening game of the NFL for weather-related reasons. Fifteen of the 16 league games were played in the stadiums they were fixed for. Cusack Park was the odd venue out. Ennis has had significant rain in recent weeks but presumably so have other counties.

Ian Hassett has this week described the sense of loss, emptiness and deep hurt experienced by his family following the death of his brother, Frankie, in an Ennis apartment in June 2011.

Fermanagh 2-11   Clare 1-5 LINING out without their Kilmaley dual players, the Clare lady footballers fell to a nine-point defeat in their opening NFL Division 2 league game against Fermanagh in Meelick on Sunday.

Rower Inistioge 2-9   Kilmaley 1-5 Kilmaley’s dream of being the first Clare club to contest an All-Ireland intermediate camogie club final ended at the hands of Kilkenny and Leinster champions Rower Inistioge on Sunday in Nowlan Park.

SIX of eight people hospitalised following a chemical spillage at Chemifloc in Shannon still hadn’t returned to work three weeks after the incident, according to a report by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

At the annual convention of Bord na nÓg hurling in December there was no opposition to a proposal from Cratloe, which asked that clubs wishing to amalgamate “maintain the same amalgamation for all age groups and should not be allowed to pick and choose clubs depending on the strength of the age group in question”.

Nineteen teams will compete for the Division 1 and 2 Clare U-14 Football Championships in 2013 if, as expected, the proposed gradings for the year are ratified by the February meeting of Bord na nÓg. That meeting was due to take place on Tuesday but was cancelled due to unforeseen circumstances.