Sports

GIVEN that one of the Lafferty sisters is an accountant and the other teaches maths, when they calculated how long they have been hitting a sliotar, their findings stunned them. Both will have central roles to play for Inagh-Kilnamona in Saturday’s Munster senior club camogie final against Tipperary champions, Burgess-Duharra, in the Gaelic Grounds at 2pm. Siobhán, who is part of the finance team at Zagg International in Shannon, is team captain at full-back, while Fiona started at full-forward in their semi-final win over Inniscarra from Cork. Their mother, Margaret, has been ever present since they first swung a hurley. “The first time I was involved, we went to Ruan for an U-11 blitz. She was in charge of that team and she has been doing it since,” Siobhán said. “You’re fairly old now so,” Fiona butted in. “Thanks for getting that out there. I’m 30, so I guess that’s 20 years of Margaret being involved,” Siobhán surmised. Fiona had …

Galway man Gavin Keary is the new Clare senior hurling coach. A player with Loughrea up to last year, he was introduced to the Clare players at training on Saturday. He replaces Donal Og Cusack who stepped down from the post just under two weeks ago. In the past two weeks a number of people were interviewed for the post before Keary, a member of the Galway minor backroom team for the past two years and manager of the Irish under 21 shinty team this year was chosen by joint managers Donal Moloney and Gerry O’Connor. While all three outgoing inter county Clare hurling managers were re-appointed at a recent board meeting, there will, it is understood, be changes to all teams. Under 21 boss John Carmody has to replace Kevin O’Grady and Colin Lynch, joint coaches of the 2017 team as both have stepped down. There is speculation that minor (under 17 this year) boss Sean Doyle is also …

Ballygunner, Waterford 1-18 Sixmilebridge 1-17 Sixmilebridge’s dream of contesting the Munster senior club hurling final ended at Walsh park in Waterford this afternoon when they went under by the minimum margin to a fancied Waterford side, Ballygunner/ It was a heartbreaking defeat for the Clare champions who, when the review the game, will reflect on missed chances and on whether or not they could have made changes which would have benefited the team. As reported last week, the Clare champions went into this game without their injured captain Paidi Fitzpatrick and while he took part in the team pre match warm up on the pitch, he played no part in the game. His absence was a blow to the team’s hopes of progressing to the final. What was mainly a crossfield breeze helped the visitors in the opening half but they finished the half strongly to led by five points, 0-11 to 0-6, when the half time whistle sounded. Their …

Clare senior hurling champions Sixmilebridge could hardly have asked for a stiffer test in the Munster Club semi-final than a meeting with their Waterford counterparts, Ballygunner, at Walsh Park but they will travel with strong support this Sunday for the game. Na Piarsaigh from Limerick or Blackrock from Cork will provide the opposition in the final. This will be Ballygunner’s eighth consecutive week in championship action. Last week, the Waterford side delivered, arguably, their best display when overcoming Thurles Sarsfields in a quarter-final tie that needed extra time. That performance showed their determination to do well in this championship. Sixmilebridge have injury concerns hanging over captain, Paidi Fitzpatrick and fellow defender, Caimin Morey. Fitzpatrick suffered a broken finger in the drawn final with Clooney-Quin. Following treatment, he played in the replay but he suffered further damage to the hand, making him an extremely doubtful starter for Sunday. A final decision on whether or not he will play will not be …

Inagh-Kilnamona 1-14 Kilmaley 1-10 Inagh-Kilnamona bridged a nine year gap when they captured the minor A hurling championship at the expense of their neighbours and great rivals Kilmaley at Cusack Park this Saturday afternoon. In a game played in very difficult weather conditions of bitterly cold and heavy rain showers, they dominated in the key areas. They led by two points at half time having played against the breeze and by the three quarter stage they had pushed their lead out to eight points and looked set for a comfortable win. Kilmaley then hit a purple patch and they scored 1-3 without reply to move to within two points of the winners with six minutes to play. The winners were clearly under pressure at this stage and with two minutes remaining they conceded a penalty. Goalkeeper Ronan Callinan came up to take the free but his effort was turned behind by his opposite number Eugene Foudy. Top scorer and the …

Kilmurry Ibrickane 1-14 Clondegad 0-14 KILMURRY Ibrickane are Clare senior football champions for the 15th time, following their victory over first time finalists, Clondegad in Cusack Park, on Sunday afternoon. Played in front of an attendance of 4,916 the game was tactical and restricted in the first half, following which the Aidan Moloney managed two in a row champions led 0-6 to 0-4. The game opened up considerably in the second half with the sides kicking 19 scores between them. However the crucial one was the green flag raised by Kilmurry substitute Peter O’Dwyer, who was put through by fellow substitute Noel Downes. O’Dwyer, who was later red carded, along with Clonegad’s Joe Neylon, slotted home the goal, which put Kilmurry into a 1-13 to 0-13 lead. O’Dwyer also scored the winning point in Kilmurry’s semi-final win over Cratloe. Clondegad did not give up and in fact they pressed Kilmurry hard over the remaining 14 minutes, which included nine minutes …

Clare 6 West Cork 2 Oscar Traynor title holders Clare have made winning start in defence of the title when they overcame West Cork at Frank Healy park this Saturday evening. The home side got off to a great start and were three goals to the good by the fourteenth minute which left the visitors with a huge task on their hands Irish junior international Eoin Hayes opened the scoring after just four minutes an dhe doubled the home side’s advantage in the eleventh minute after he was put through by Eoin Hayes. Hayes then turned provided as his break created the opening which saw Gary O’Connell score the home side’s third Twenty minutes later Hayes was involved again as he created the opportunity which led to Dave McCarthy finding the net. West Cork, to their credit, didn’t drop their heads and they hit back two minutes after McCarthy’s strike for a John Kelly goal and this left the score …

A veteran of Clondegad’s 1997 Junior B Championship win, Mikey Hehir is a manager with significant experience behind him. Now in his second stint at the helm of Clondegad, prior to that he managed Ballyea for three years. From Drumquin in Ballynacally, Hehir won two junior championships with Clondegad and played in two losing intermediate finals, before succumbing to a knee injury, having had an initial operation at 15. “Eventually the knee gave way. Every year it was getting harder and harder to come back. I started not making the team, so I got involved with the hurlers in Ballyea as a coach, about seven or eight years ago. As that year progressed, I ended up falling into the manager’s role. We had three relegation battles, one final and two semi-finals. We won two U-21 B in that period and the following year, when Robbie Hogan, Raymond O’Connor and Donal Kelly came in, they won the U-21 A. It was …