Sports

Clare Senior Hurling Championship Final Feakle v Sixmilebridge at Cusack Park Ennis, Sunday 3pm (Joe Mullins, Clonlara) While it’s the first time that this proud clubs have met each other in a senior decider, their contrasting experience of finals does provide one of the main backdrops to the outcome to the latest winners of the Canon Hamilton. After all, the ‘Bridge backed by over half the side that captured five senior titles in eight years up to 2020, are old hands at competing for senior honours and possess the necessary winning know-how and experience to be able to take things in their stride and play to their potential. That guile was noteworthy against both Clonlara and Inagh-Kilnamona in that while they didn’t dominate those ties, they were always within striking difference and managed to step things up when required most to get the job done. That’s the main fear for Feakle supporters really in their fairytale return to a first …

SENIOR CAMOGIE CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL TRUAGH-CLONLARA 2-11 INAGH-KILNAMONA 2-7 This County final took a long time to ignite but once Clare Hehir superbly blasted to the roof of the net the game came alive. Up until that moment it was pretty dour stuff. The first half was tight with space at a premium. The champions were the better of the two though and deservedly led by four at the end of the opening quarter with Leah Hawes coolly slotting to the net after a defensive error presented the full forward with the opportunity. Inagh-Kilnamona were struggling for scores and indeed only registered one point from play in that first period with Fiona Lafferty firing over a sixth minute peach. Free taker Aoibhin Ryan kept them in touch with a trio of placed balls and at the interval Foudy’s charges trailed by four on a 1-5 to 0-4 scoreline. Upon the resumption of play centre forward Aoibhin Ryan landed three of the …

Wherever the 2024 Canon Hamilton race is being discussed be it in the home of the two protagonists or hurling communities all over the County the conversation will without doubt centre around the man who has been this year’s stand out performer. Questions like Who will mark McGrath? and statements like if you stop McGrath you stop Feakle will be banded about. The Bridge management team will obviously detail someone to man mark Shane McGrath but that isn’t anything new for the Feakle wizard. “ Ah I’m well used to being man marked. To be honest about it it would feel strange not to be and I probably wouldn’t know what to do. Anyways with the likes of Conn and Adam in training it’s probably easier in a match.” he says laughing “ but seriously though I’m lucky that I’m allowed to roam wherever I feel I might find space by the management team. Ger and the lads put great …

As Jamie Shanahan prepares to lead Sixmilebridge behind the Tulla Pipe Band today (Sunday), it’s not the fact that he’s lining out for his eighth senior decider that’s surprising but the fact that he has achieved that remarkable feat by the mere age of 30. Clare’s last three year county minor and just as significantly the last Sixmilebridge underage player to blossom onto the inter-county senior championship stage, Shanahan is unquestionably the most talented player of his generation albeit that injuries have dogged his adult career. “To be honest, I’ve probably missed the bones of two or three years if you add them all up between back surgeries, a shoulder injury when I was 18 and then missing all of last year with an ankle injury. “It is frustrating but just part and parcel of sport. I mean last year I didn’t puck a ball and I won’t say it’s something you get over because it’s not, it’s extremely frustrating …

When they gathered on Feakle’s Fair Green on the second last Saturday in July it was in hope and hurling that history was at hand as the village’s famous festival came a month early. A balmy evening with tunes to the power of hurling played into the night and when people like Fr Harry Bohan and Tommy Guilfoyle among those who held court on the eve of the All-Ireland final in Croke Park as Marty Morrissey and his RTÉ camera crew came calling. They were ‘Up for the Match’ – up for the All-Ireland as that hope and history rhymed in this bedrock and foundation stone of Clare hurling that has always weaned itself on stories and songs about the game and what the wider meaning of it all. Thing is, they’re up for this match more. That’s Feakle, but more than that in the local vernacular of any one of a gold and green hue it’s ‘Faykell’. The club …

Fr Harry Bohan will be doing everything to be present in Cusack Park on Sunday – that’s what the father figure of Feakle and Clare hurling told medics when he was recently hospitalised after a minor stroke, writes Joe Ó Muircheartaigh A pen picture in the pages of The Clare Champion all of 66 years ago about a Feakle hurling man is as relevant today as it was way back then in the formative years of one man’s love of the game and his native place. The few lines may be sepia-toned now, but being older hasn’t made them any less relevant as they provide a window into the hurling man that was Harry Bohan in 1958. Words that ring true today as they were back in August 1958 when he prepared for the biggest day of his hurling life. A young man barely out of his teenage years, who was part of the Feakle team back in a county …

The names roll off the tongue like they’re present generation and training away this week at O’Garney Park for the county final that awaits. Here’s a commentator who doesn’t need the match programme before his eyes like he’s in the commentary box and the sliotar is about to be thrown in. These names are committed to memory and flow. The father figure of ‘Bridge hurling and that team in Mike O’Shea in goal; Jamesy Keogh, Peter Golden and Christy Murray in the full-back line; Sean Stack the captain at centre-back with Flan Collins and Paddy Deegan on the flanks. He goes on: Flan McInerney and Stephen Murray in the middle; goalscorer and club chairman of the day PJ Fitzpatrick at centre-forward, with Leo Quinlan and Pat Morey on the wings; match-winner Mikey Whyte top of the right, with the legendary Noel Casey on the edge of the square and Pat Chaplin at 15. Syl O’Connor knows their names, just because …

Ger Conway is a proud Feakle man and feels Sunday is reward for all the hard work that has been done by everyone involved in hurling in East Clare. ” Firstly these lads have put in a fair shift to get to this stage and i don’t think anyone would deny we are here on merit. We’ve been building towards this for a while now and there’s plenty of people who deserve huge credit for the work in the club and schools. We’ve first had the great Harty success of Tulla and then the brilliant amalgamation of Feakle-Killanena winning the under 21. We’ve a lot of county players at different levels and we have been improving year after year. When we came back up in 2017 we had just the fifteen really but now we’ve a panel of players and the Junior is going well too which keeps training competitive. Overall this club totally deserves a shot at glory but by God …