Let’s take a look at some of the stories making the headlines for Scoreline and KCLR on Tuesday 15 November.
Future of camogie
Thomastown camogie manager Ger Walsh is optimistic about the future direction of the club while hoping he can also stave off retirements in the post-season. The Kilkenny senior county champions were knocked out of the Leinster senior championship at the weekend in a goal-heavy game against St. Vincents, with the Dubliners now set to face Oulart The Ballagh in Sunday’s provincial decider.
Speaking to KCLR, Walsh says it’s not just Thomastown’s prospects that are looking good.
“The future is bright for Thomastown. Coming off the back of the pandemic like that, as we said during the summer an awful lot of girls went on holidays which you have to do. You have to keep your head right mentally, you have to keep yourself right but I mean there’s a lot of good girls coming through”, says Walsh.
“The future is bright for camogie in general in Kilkenny when you look around a lot of the other clubs as well. But Thomastown will be up there, there or thereabouts again next year, we just maybe need to push on. I just hope there’s no more retirements or talk of retirements but you never know.”
Thomastown will be guaranteed at least one award out of the Camán Caint Player of the Year awards with Joanne Fitzpatrick, Sarah Walsh and Anna Farrell all in the running for this year’s Senior Player of the Year. Voting in that continues on scoreline.ie this week with winners announced at a special event at the beginning of December.
Plant The Planet
Also on the camogie front, All-Star nominee Grace Walsh is heading to Kenya this week along with Danesfort’s Paul Murphy for the Plant The Planet Games.
In all there are over 50 GAA stars from around the country taking part, staging the first All-Star game played in Africa as well as the first combined male and female GAA game with hurling, camogie and football on show.
There is very much a humanitarian side to the trip though as Grace told Full Time on Monday night.
“Playing camogie with Kilkenny has given me this opportunity, it’s incredible”, says Walsh, who is set to depart for Kenya this coming Sunday. “I think sometimes we forget the privileged position that a lot of us are in. I suppose we take for granted sometimes that so many of us have a bed to sleep in at night, food on the table, water that we can drink. It’s great to be able to raise this money to go on this trip, to plant the trees and to improve the lives of people who are not fortunate enough to do that for themselves.”
Fr. Tommy Murphy, Palatine team remembered
Tributes are also being paid this morning to the late Father Tommy Murphy, two-time All-Ireland winner with Kilkenny against Waterford in 1963 and Cork in 1969 and one of the founders of O’Loughlin Gaels in Kilkenny City.
In an online tribute, the club have described him as “an advocate of the merit of promoting young people in sport using his passion for GAA and hurling as the platform”.
In Carlow, Palatine GAA club are set to honour the men of 1972 – 50 years on from winning the club’s sole Carlow senior hurling championship. The event takes place at clubhouse on Saturday evening with all welcome to attend.
100 not out
Louise Quinn was on the scoresheet on Monday evening for Ireland’s women as they beat Morocco in an international friendly – their 10th fixture of the year to date. Quinn picked up her 100th international cap with Megan Campbell, Kyra Carusa and Kate McCabe also hitting the net.
Carlow Kilkenny FC have announced assessments for the 2023 season for all underage national league squads – that’s U14, 15 and 17 for men with U17 and U19 for women. Registration details are on scoreline.ie this morning.
And Man United are understood to be examining if they can sack Cristiano Ronaldo following the striker’s explosive interview with TALK TV. The Portuguese told Piers Morgan that he didn’t respect manager Erik Ten Hag and he added that he believed the owners – the Glazer family – don’t care about the club.
Ronaldo has now travelled to Qatar to play at the World Cup with Portugal. The 37 year old is under contract at Old Trafford until next summer, but has surely played his last game for the club.
