Sports

Kilmurry-Ibrickane 1-13   Doonbeg 0-9 This is one of the few Cusack Cup games to generate interest amongst the general public. This was reflected by the sizeable crowd at the second-round game in Shanahan McNamara Park last Saturday evening. When Kilmurry play Doonbeg, incident and maximum effort levels are a given. The incident was catered for eight minutes before half-time when Doonbeg’s Conor Whelan was red-carded following an incident with Michael O’Dwyer. There was a time when Doonbeg lifted their game to a new level if they found themselves a man down. Last weekend wasn’t one of those times. Kilmurry led 0-6 to 0-4 at half-time, with Noel Downes, Enda Coughlan, Tom Lernihan and Peter O’Dwyer finding the target for the winners. Conor Downes, Enda Doyle and Brian Dillon scored Doonbeg’s first-half points. The home club upped their game in the early minutes of the second half. Points from Dillon and Frank O’Dea, sandwiched between a Noel Downes reply, left Kilmurry …

THERE will be a repeat of last year’s senior hurling championship semi-final meeting between Sixmilebridge and their neighbours, Cratloe in the opening round of the 2012 title race.That was just one of a number of interesting pairings thrown up when the draws for the 2012 championships were made last Friday.Title holders, Crusheen, who are chasing a third success in-a-row, have been grouped with Broadford, Tulla and Newmarket.The senior football championship has undergone a noticeable change in format this year. Instead of four groups of four, as has been the case for the past decade, the event is now organised on an open draw format with first-round losers getting a second chance to get back into the competition.Previously, there was no seeding involved and all 16 teams were in the hat when the draw for the eight first-round games was made. In the past couple of seasons, current champions Kilmurry-Ibrickane have struggled to account for Cratloe so when the draw paired …

Twelve-year-old Martin Mongans was crowned Munster 50kg boy 2 Munster boxing champion in Kilmallock recently. A pupil at Ennis National school, Martin boxes out of the Our Lady of Lourdes Club in Limerick.On his way to the title he stopped his opponent in both the semi-final and final.He will box for the national title next week in Dublin. Martin comes from a family that is steeped in boxing. His father, John, is a former Munster champion while his uncles and brothers have also boxed at provincial and national levels.   Clare boxers chase national honours The National Boys’ Boxing Championships, traditionally held during school holidays in Easter, will get under in the National Stadium in Dublin next Monday, continuing through to Saturday, when the finals will be boxed off. Clare boxers, who had a fantastic innings in last year’s championships, will defend their titles and are hoping for a repeat of last year’s heroics, having come through the Munster championships …

You would’ve believed a man could fly. If spectators took anything from Shannon Kickboxing Club’s sixth annual show last weekend it was that gravity-defiance wasn’t the realm of just Superman or Neo from the Matrix. In round two of one of the last fights on the card, Ethan ‘The Animal’ Kerin launched a jumping front snap kick into the face of his opponent Danny ‘The Hammer’ Joyce. It was the sort of move you seldom see in the lightweight bouts, let alone at super heavyweight, but bucking the physical trends of his weight class seems to be becoming something of a habit for the Ennis Kickboxing Club pugilist.While the second round was a good one for ‘The Animal’, it hadn’t all been plain sailing for the fighter. Squaring off against Joyce for the second time – the two fought last year at the same venue with Kerin coming out on top in his kickboxing debut – the Ennis man started …

It is rare to find women willing to talk about their age, even more peculiar to find ones who will speak about their weight. The ladies of Kilfenora Boxing Club are different. With eight teenage girls in the club and seven of them fighting in the All-Ireland finals at the end of the month, they are proud to don the gloves and enter the ring. Fourteen-year-old Clóda Collins took up boxing back in September. The Ennistymon Vocational School student loves her new sport and is looing forward to her All-Ireland debut.“I took up boxing because I wanted to stay fit for camogie. I love sport. I am not a real girly girl. I love to be outside. I hate being stuck inside, except being in the ring or gym,” she tells The Clare Champion.“Boxing is a good sport and it keeps your fitness levels very high and it is enjoyable. I was a bit scared at first going into the …

Clare 3-13 Kerry 2-12 IF the Clare lady footballers were a weather front, we’d be living in as variable climate as is imaginable.Their football is definitely full of variety, although their spirit seems resolute. If it wasn’t, they would have been well beaten by Kerry in Doonbeg last Sunday. Their four-point win secured a Division 2 semi-final place against Galway on Sunday, April 29 but that’s a mere particle of the story. Throughout the hour, Clare mixed excellent defending with porous defensive play, sublime attacking football with ponderous play in front of goal, aggression with placidity. The paucity of their first-half innings is underlined by the fact that Clare were eight points adrift (1-8 to 0-3) in the 29th minute. Luckily, Maria Kelly’s goal, a minute before the interval, infused Clare with vim and hope as they sat and plotted the remaining half hour’s football. Kelly’s crucial and impressively executed goal was created by slick combination play involving Eimear O’Connor …

Kerry 5-10 Clare 2-4 Clare lost out to Kerry in Kilmoyley on Sunday afternoon in the provincial U-16C Camogie Championship semi-final.The home side took an early three-point lead before Caroline Walsh goaled for Clare in the 10th minute to level the game. This was cancelled by Kerry’s first goal of the game from Eirne Ní Dasmhunaigh seven minutes later. Kerry added another two points before Lauren Tuohy converted a free for Clare with 22 minutes on the clock. Kerry were on a hunt for goals and grabbed their second in the 25th minute when Ní Dheasmhunaigh got to the rebound after Shauna Ryan had blocked Cora O’Carroll’s original shot. Clare added three points before the half-time whistle, Tuohy with a point from play and a 45 and Lisa O’Donoghue sending over a shot from the wing, leaving Clare trailing by four points at the break. Jessica Fitzell pointed for Kerry five minutes into the second half. Clare responded with a …

Lissycasey  1-10   Cooraclare  2-7 When Cooraclare went seven points clear inside the last quarter of this Garry Cup tie at Cooraclare on Friday night, they looked to be heading for their first win of the campaign.However, a strong finish from Lissycasey earned them a merited share of the spoils.The visitors had the better of the first half and should have been more than two points clear at half-time when the score stood at 0-5 to 0-3. In the second quarter, they had failed to convert two great goal opportunities.On the resumption, Cooraclare grabbed the initiative and goals from Gearóid Looney and Sean Maguire, together with some good points from John Looney, helped them open a seven-point gap inside the last quarter.To their credit, Lissycasey regained the initiative and points from Francis Hayes, Enda Finnucane and David Considine were followed by an excellent Francis Hayes goal to earn a share of the spoils.Gerry Moran, Cyril Sheehan and Matt Gilroy were others …