With a fresh start to the day around Kilkenny and Carlow, here’s a look at some of the stories making the headlines on KCLR and Scoreline.ie for Tuesday 29 November.
On the hurling front, the GAA have announced a change in the order of games for this weekend’s Leinster senior club hurling and football finals doubleheader.
With Kilmacud Crokes contesting both games on Sunday and counting dual star Brian Sheehy among their ranks, Sunday’s hurling final will now lead off with Ballyhale Shamrocks taking to Croke Park at 2.30pm with Kilmacud’s football decider against The Downs switched out to 4.30pm.
Sheehy is expected to feature heavily in the hurling, likely starting on the bench for the football.
It’s also being reported this morning that James Stephens midfielder Conor Browne has opted out of selection for Derek Lyng’s first season in charge of the Kilkenny senior hurlers. Browne started this year’s All-Ireland final against Limerick and was a regular under Brian Cody but looks set to take the next year out to go travelling, with Mikey Carey already set to miss the 2023 campaign for the Cats.
Cats back in the big leagues
In football, the fixtures list for the 2023 LIDL Ladies National Football League have been announced.
Kilkenny LGFA confirmed at the weekend that they would be making a return to the national stage and will take up home for 2023 in Division 4B of the league, alongside Derry, Leitrim, Limerick and Wicklow. Their first league fixture comes at home to Limerick on January 22nd, wrapping up the group stages with a road trip to Wicklow in late February.
In camogie today, SETU Carlow begin this year’s Purcell Cup championship this afternoon when they take on T-U-S Midlands in Athlone from 2pm.
Bonus points matter
Tullow Rugby Club are making their bonus points count this season, having picked up a bonus point win over Cill Dara in the Leinster League at the weekend to leapfrog Carlow into third. Between winning and losing, the club have racked up six bonus points from their games so far this season showing that they’re taking away something from each fixture and in three cases, keeping the games close.
They’re among the highest for points scored this season and have the third-best defence to date but this weekend will host league leaders and promotion favourites Wicklow. Speaking on last night’s Full Time, Tullow’s Johnny Tobin told KCLR that while they’re in a better place this year, closing out games is key. You can listen to that full interview here.
Early entries for Punchestown
The initial entries for the seven Grade 1 races at this year’s Leopardstown Christmas Festival have been released. The festival runs from St Stephen’s Day, December 26 to Thursday, December 29. Champion trainer Willie Mullins is responsible for 12 of this year’s Paddy Power Chase entrants, Captain Kangaroo, Authorized Art and Bleu Berry chief among them.
It’s the feature race on Day 2 with €200,000 at stake.
Last chance for Wales?
And at the World Cup, two Bruno Fernandes goals – the second from the penalty spot – saw Portugal beat Uruguay 2-0 last night to advance to the World Cup knockout stage alongside Brazil.
The final rounds of fixtures in Groups A and B take place today where a win for the Netherlands over hosts Qatar will see them finish top of Group A. That renders the clash of Senegal and Ecuador in Al Rayyan as a straight shootout for a last-16 place, with the South American side starting the game a point better off.
The Group A matches start at 3pm.
England head into this evening’s final Group B games top of the pile on four points, but their opponents Wales need a win if they’re to keep alive hopes of going through. They may need to dig deep and eke out a 4-0 victory after the disappointment of their 2-0 loss to Iran. Goalkeeper Wayne Hennessy misses out following his revised red card on Friday last.
But it’s the highly-charged meeting of Iran and the United States that is likely to produce the team that joins England in the last 16. Kick-off in both of those games is at 7.
