Wednesday brings the rain, starts our focus on some of the live games of the weekend and the morning headlines feature camogie, the GAA’s presidential elections, Champions League action, rugby and boxing.
‘Rangers head to Maynooth
Mount Leinster Rangers head to Kildare this weekend to being their Leinster camogie championship journey.
The Carlow junior champions are showing serious signs of progress on the camogie front this year, culminating in their county final win over Burren Rangers last month.
Manager Derek Deegan joined the Caman Caint podcast last night where his says despite being in bonus territory, the hunger is there to win against Maynooth on Saturday. You can listen to his full interview in the early minutes of this week’s edition of the Camán Caint podcast.
We’ll have updates from that game on air this weekend.
Tickets are also on sale online only for the Leinster football championships this weekend. Mullinavat and Clonmore are in action at 1.30pm Saturday in the intermediate and junior championships, both with home ties, but access to John Locke Parke and Netwatch Cullen park will be by ticket-in-advance only with no cash sales on the day.
The same applies for Palatine’s clash with Portarlington on Sunday afternoon which you can hear live on KCLR with thanks to Dan Morrissey and co.
Elsewhere, Armagh have officially nominated Jarlath Burns for the role of GAA president.
Burns lost out to current president Larry McCarthy in the 2020 election.
Leinster council chair Pat Teehan, who was nominated by the Offaly GAA is also in the running along with Donegal’s Niall Erskine. Their names go to a vote at Congress in February.
Kemboy heads to Down Royal
Local champion trainer Willie Mullins plans to run Kemboy in the first Grade 1 race of the season, the Ladbrokes Champion Chase at Down Royal this Saturday.
Mullins won the very first running of this race back in 1999. It remains his only victory but he has confirmed that Kemboy, a four-time Grade 1 winner, will represent him in this year’s renewal
“He missed going to America where the Shark won the American Grand National”, says Mullins of Kemboy. “Things just weren’t right so we said we’d wait and go to Down Royal. It can be very heavy or the ground can be very good. If it’s good, he has a very good chance. He’s more a good ground horse than a heavy ground horse.
“So depending on the weather, I’m praying for rain for most of my other horses but not for Kemboy.”
Spurs leave it late, Liverpool beat Napoli
Spurs have joined Liverpool, Chelsea and Man City in the knockout stages of this year’s Champions League.
Despite trailing earlier in the second half, Spurs pulled back level with Marseille thanks to a goal from Clement Lenglet before Pierre Hojbjerg hit a late winner to help Spurs top the group.
Eintracht Frankfurt will join them in the next round after they managed to beat Sporting 2-1.
Liverpool and Napoli played out a decent attacking game last night despite both sides already being assured of a place in the knockouts. The Italians had a goal ruled out by VAR in the second half, Liverpool making the most of their set-piece chances to bag two late goals, the second confirmed by VAR for Darwin Nunez just over 9 minutes into stoppage time.
Tonight, Man City are in action against Sevilla with Chelsea hosting Dinamo Zagreb, both games with an 8pm kick off.
World Cup or bust
Jonathan Sexton says Ireland’s status as world number one will count for nought unless they win the World Cup next year.
Ireland could surrender top spot in the world rankings on Saturday if they lose to the Springboks on Saturday. You can watch all of Sexton’s press conference below. Ireland have home advantage but need to make the result count to maintain their number one status. If you’ve ever wondered how the rankings are calculated, here’s a handy link.
Down to dance
Amanda Serrano says she wants a rematch with Katie Taylor in Ireland next year.
The Puerto Rican has been ordered by the WBA to fight their featherweight champion Erika Cruz in a unification bout.
Serrano tweeted to say she wants to fight Taylor in Ireland after that bout, with Croke Park the most likely venue.
Taylor beat Serrano by split decision at Madison Square Garden in April.
