Sports

Colm Collins will take charge of the Clare senior footballers for a 7th season after he was officially ratified in the role for the coming year. The Cratloe clubman becomes the third longest serving current inter-county football manager with only Jim Gavin and Mickey Harte ahead of him. Collins was ratified for a one year term at Tuesday evening’s meeting of Clare GAA where he was returned unopposed for another term in charge. Chairman of Clare GAA Joe Cooney told the meeting that it was brilliant news that Collins is to stay on for another year and outlined that during his time in charge, there has been huge progress for Clare football. 2019 saw Clare retain their status in Division Two of the National League with a dramatic victory over Tipperary on the last day of the campaign in Semple Stadium. The championship came to an end in the last round of qualifiers when a one point loss to Meath …

Two Clare players have been honoured for their performances during the 2019 Minor Hurling Championship. Clare captain Cian Galvin and star forward Shane Meehan have both been selected on the Electric Ireland GAA Minor Team of the Year after a campaign which saw the Banner reach the Munster final before contesting the All-Ireland quarter-final series. Clarecastle’s Galvin is selected in the centre-back position after his outstanding displays across the campaign with Banner GAA man Meehan is selected at corner-forward in recognition of his scoring exploits. Meehan was on the score-sheet in each of Clare’s seven games across the minor hurling championship, with the standout performance coming in the last of those when he notched 0-13 during the Banner’s loss to Galway. Galvin was immense in a defensive role for Clare throughout the year while his accuracy from long range frees contributed vital scores. He also scored a late goal in the defeat to Galway. Meehan enjoyed a brilliant campaign across …

CLARE joint senior hurling manager, Gerry O’Connor, has announced his decision to step down from the role. The former All-Ireland winning joint U-21 manager has filled the role for three years, along with Donal Moloney. Clare reached successive Munster finals in 2017 and 2018, losing both to Cork. They were also very unlucky not to reach an All-Ireland final in 2018, losing narrowly to Galway in a replay. This season they failed to emerge from the round robin series of games in the Munster senior hurling championship. Tuesday’s Clare County Board meeting heard that no decision has yet been made with regard to the make up of the incoming management team.

Two Clare women are set to take on one of the most renowned golf courses in the world next week as part of the Coronation Foursomes. East Clare Golf Club duo Rachel Whelan and Marie Donnellan are preparing to travel St Andrews next Monday where they will play the Eden Course in the Grand Final of this year’s tournament. It marks the latest step in their progression having only taken up the sport in 2017 through the “Get into Golf” programme hosted by East Clare Golf Club before joining as full members the following year. They won the qualifying competition on their home course before going on to win the Area Final where the first prize was an all expenses paid trip to the famous Scottish venue. They will be representing Ireland while competing against 15 other qualifying pairs from Northern Ireland, Scotland , England and Wales. The R&A Coronation Foursomes is the largest domestic golf participation event for women …

On this week’s podcast: We review the weekend’s club hurling action and argue over the best 15 clubs players in Clare over the last decade.     [soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/675510716?secret_token=s-bdw8c” params=”color=#ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&show_teaser=true” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

THE draw for the quarter-final stage in the race for the Canon Hamilton, and the intermediate title, were completed this evening and read as follows: Senior Hurling Quarter-final draw: Ballyea v Crusheen Cratloe v Clonlara Inagh-Kilnamona v Feakle Sixmilebridge v Éire Óg   Intermediate Hurling Quarter-final draw: Broadford v Sixmilebridge Scariff v Inagh-Kilnamona Smith O’Brien’s v Killanena Tubber v St Joseph’s Doora-Barefield

It is another huge weekend of Clare club hurling action with the last quarter-final spots in the senior and intermediate championship up for grabs, while the relegation battle is also heating up. Clare Senior Hurling Championship Round Three Preview Cusack Park on Saturday at 2pm: Newmarket v Eire Óg The honour of getting a bumper afternoon of action at HQ underway falls to the Blues and the Townies, in what could well prove to be the most competitive game of the day. Newmarket come into the tie off the back of what will have been a morale boosting victory over O’Callaghan’s Mills last time out and following their brief flirtation with relegation in recent years, that anchor has now been lifted which will take a huge amount of pressure off their shoulders. Eire Óg will also come into the game with a positive mind frame despite suffering a defeat to Clonlara a fortnight ago. They may have come out on …

It is a critical weekend of action as the last four spots in the race for the Canon will be filled. There are four really good games ahead in Round 3, but the meeting of Cratloe and Kilmaley is the one that most attention will be fixed on. Both have been mentioned as championship contenders from the outset, but it is the fiasco that surrounded Kilmaley’s win over Whitegate that has had people talking most over the last two weeks. There have been numerous questions over what actually happened in Sixmilebridge that day and what effect it will have had on Kilmaley. It remains to be seen if the fallout will have had a detrimental impact on the dynamic of the management team and the preparation of the team for this game in particular, or will it be something that galvanises them for the challenge ahead? On the Cratloe front, I still can’t believe how poor they were against Inagh-Kilnamona. …