It’s Friday all over again so ahead of a giant weekend of live sport for KCLR, let’s take a look at the stories making headlines this morning.
Beginning with Gaelic Games and the Kilkenny minor hurling team to face Clare in Saturday’s All-Ireland semi-final has been named.
With a bit of defensive shuffling going on, manager Niall Bergin has also made two changes to the starting fifteen that lined out against Galway in last Friday’s Leinster final with David Barcoe and James O’Neill dropping to the bench in place of Cialann Brennan and Bill McDermott. We’ll have live commentary on air with Adrian Ronan and Pat Hoban at lunchtime Saturday with thanks to Direct Water Treatment.
Camogie derby
Following an unbeaten league campaign that saw them claim the Division 3A title this year and coming the hard route through the provincial championship, Carlow find themselves in a Leinster intermediate camogie decider against Kilkenny this weekend. It’s not too often we get the neighbouring counties meeting in adult competition, but when they do this Saturday, Carlow will have home advantage with SETU Carlow’s main campus providing the backdrop.
We heard from Carlow manager Peter ‘Chap’ Cleere on this week’s Camán Caint podcast and he told Martin and Áine that while he may be from Kilkenny, he’ll be flying the Carlow colours proudly this weekend. Listen to Cleere’s interview below as the first segment on this week’s podcast.
Staying with that doubleheader and despite it being a competition that Kilkenny haven’t had too much success in in recent years, manager Seamus Kelly says his side are intent on bringing a third title in since 2015 back home. You can hear his thoughts on Camán Caint above.
That game comes as part of a Super Saturday of live sport on Scoreline that begins with the lunchtime meeting of Kilkenny and Clare in the All-Ireland minor hurling championship semi-final at 1pm. We’re going from Semple Stadium straight to SETU Carlow for the aforementioned Leinster final at 2.30pm, beginning full frequency before transitioning to Kilkenny so we can squeeze in Carlow and Limerick’s senior football clash in Carlow at 3pm.
We’ll be coming straight out of Netwatch Cullen Park and heading to the Aviva Stadium in Dublin with Brendan and Mick for this year’s Heineken Champions Cup final between Leinster and La Rochelle. That one kicks off at 4.45pm full frequency but we’ll split at half time to bring you the second half in Carlow because at 5.30pm we’re heading to UPMC Nowlan Park to get the lowdown on Kilkenny’s Leinster senior hurling championship clash with Dublin.
Results recap
Results-wise last night, there was one game in the Kilkenny Vehicle Centre minor C hurling league last night, Blacks and Whites hosting John Lockes. That one finished 2-12 to 1-9 to the Callan men. In Carlow we had two games in the Bolger Cup and Shield; in the Cup, Ballinkillen v Bagenalstown finished 2-19 to 1-13 in favour of Bagenalstown, while in the shield, Carlow Town lost out to St. Mullins 3-13 to 3-10.
Tonight there’s a handful of games in the Carlow football league including the Division 1 meeting of Fenagh and Palatine at 7.30pm.
Premier League & The Great Escape
We were served another twist in the tale that is the Premier League with Newcastle hosting Brighton at St. James’ Park. The highest Newcastle, or anyone not named Man City or Arsenal will finish this year is third but a win for Brighton would have meant the lowest they could finish seventh. They still have a game in hand over Liverpool and Spurs heading into this weekend but in the end, it finished 4-1 to Eddie Howe’s side which leaves Newcastle third on 69 points with two games to play, Brighton sixth on 58 but with a game in hand over Liverpool who have two games left.
The real viewing was elsewhere though – Roma got through their Europa League semi-final with Jose Mourinho at the helm and they’ll face Sevilla – who you would think would be tired of being in Europa League finals – after dumping out Juventus in extra time. West Ham will also play Fiorentina in this year’s Europa Conference League final following their win over AZ.
As for Sheffield Wednesday, they staged possibly the greatest-ever playoff comeback, going into their second leg of the League 1 semi-finals last night against Peterborough 4-0, they scored in the 97th minute to force extra time at 4-4, finishing extra time 5-5, then sealing a shoot-out win.
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