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Ard Scoil Rís seek second title


DEFENDING Harty Cup, Munster Colleges Senior A Hurling champions, Ard Scoil Rís from Limerick will carry the favourites’ tag into Sunday’s final against Charleville CBS at Limerick’s Gaelic Grounds.

Winners of the title for the first time in the school’s history last season, they won a magnificent semi-final against St Flannan’s at the same venue two weeks ago. That game has been described by many followers as one of the greatest seen in the competition.
The Limerick school’s panel for Sunday’s final includes half a dozen Clare players. Four will be in the starting line-up. They are Jamie Shanahan (Sixmilebridge), Martin Moroney (Parteen) and the Meelick pair, Oisín Hickey and Damian Moloney, in addition to Bobby Sherlock and Colin Ryan from Meelick, who are part of the panel.
Shanahan, Moroney, Hickey and Moloney have excelled in all of their team’s games in this campaign. They are part of the Clare minor panel currently preparing for the Munster championship.
Charleville will be appearing in the Harty Cup final for only the second time in the history of the competition. Their previous appearance was back in the 1930s. They knocked out St Caimin’s from Shannon as their draw in the final group game meant the Shannon side lost out by one point on score difference.
They have improved steadily throughout the campaign and will be expected to make the Limerick side battle all the way for victory.
However, Ard Scoil Rís remain firm favourites to retain the title and take a step close to a first ever Croke Cup (All-Ireland title) success.

Clare interest in Fitzgibbon Cup
Fitzgibbon Cup (third-level colleges) action will also feature on the hurling scene this weekend and there will be plenty of Clare interest as the competition comes to a conclusion for 2011.
Waterford IT will host the semi-finals and final of the Fitzgibbon Cup and come Saturday evening, at least one Clare player will have a winners’ medal to place in the trophy cabinet.
All four teams remaining in the title race have Clare involvement, with Limerick IT leading the way in terms of numbers.
The Davy Fitzgerald-managed side will take on UCC in the semi-final, with University of Limerick facing Cork IT in the other semi-final.
In 2005, Fitzgerald managed Limerick IT to their first Fitzgibbon Cup title and he was again in charge when they retained the crown in 2007. They were beaten in the 2008 final. They are fancied by many to win back the crown this year and their starting 15 is expected to include Eamonn Glynn (Inagh-Kilnamona), Conor Cooney, Pat Donnellan (both O’Callaghan’s Mills), James McInerney (Newmarket) and Sean Collins (Cratloe), all members of the current Clare senior panel, as well as Newmarket’s Bernard Gaffney, Martin Duggan (Clooney-Quin) and Brian Glynn (Inagh-Kilnamona), who have been introduced regularly throughout this campaign.
Clonlara’s Darach Honan, also a member of the Clare senior panel, is a member of the UCC team.
Brendan Buglar (Whitegate), another member of Ger O’Loughlin’s county senior squad, and Tulla’s Andrew Quinn will be in the University of Limerick team, which will play Cork IT, who will have Tubber’s Patrick O’Connor, also a member of the Clare senior panel, in the other semi-final.

 

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