Donegal fans around the country will be buoyed to hear the news that star forward, Paddy McBrearty played a full 60 minutes for his club Kilcar yesterday. The Donegal forward was in tantalising form last season as the Tir Conaill men stormed to an Ulster title win, however, he tore his cruciate in the Ulster Final and subsequently missed his …
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With the Allianz Leagues officially coming to an end and the build-up to the All-Ireland Championship beginning, it’s time to assess each of the teams competing in 2019. While Mayo may have won the league, are they really top of the pile? Does a first national title in 18 years mean you should leapfrog the team going for five-in-a-row? Where …
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“The league is probably the most exciting part of the year because you are playing week on week and that’s what players want.” – Mickey Burke (Meath). A Mayo revival, a Leitrim wave and a third division as tight as a snare drum… what a league campaign it was. Over the last three months fans up and down the country …
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As Dublin continue to dominate Gaelic football and only a few strongholds like Mayo, Kerry, Tyrone etc. looking capable of challenging them in the near future. Is it time we adopted a two-tier championship? Everybody has an opinion on where the future of Gaelic Games lies, but when it comes to whether we should adopt a two-tier championship, it’s probably …
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With the GAA season in full swing, most observers are engrossed in the action on the field. With the likes of Wexford, Galway and Cork lighting up the championship, 2017 is shaping up to be a memorable race for the Liam MacCarthy Cup. However, never far away from people’s lips is the discussion over championship restructure. After Congress introduced the …
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Sky Sports have announced their line up of fixtures for the upcoming championship season after signing a new five-year deal with the GAA in December. The broadcaster will treat us to 20 live games throughout the summer, it was confirmed at Croke Park this morning. 14 of those games will be exclusively live, the first of which will see Dublin …
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At the 1996 meeting of the GAA annual congress, delegates considered a radical proposal. Since 1887, the hurling championship had been a straight knockout tournament. Provincial winners met in the All-Ireland semi-finals and the champions were the one team that never lost a single game. By the mid-1990’s however, the championship was in need of a shake up. By that …
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February 25th, 2017 is a date that will go down in history for all the wrong reasons. The GAA Congress voted in the motion of a ‘Super 8’ system to reform the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship’s quarter-final stages. The motion was supported by a whopping 76%. The result of the vote will see the All-Ireland quarter-final stage now split into two groups of …
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After five years in the realm as Cavan manager, Terry Hyland has resigned from his post. On live radio on Tuesday evening, Hyland announced that he will be no longer be in charge of the Cavan senior football team. Although Hyland is “sad to be leaving the lads”, he said he understood that his time is up and he has got Cavan as far …
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Meath crashed out of the All-Ireland Football Championship in the second round of the qualifiers after Derry came from seven points down to send the Royal County packing. After the match manager Mick O’Dowd resigned after three years in the job. He spoke of how proud he was to lead Meath through a transition phase, but in reality this stage has only …
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The draw for the 2016 provincial Hurling Championships was made on Thursday night, throwing up some fascinating encounters. Munster giants Tipperary and Cork will meet at the quarter-final stage this year whilst Waterford will face Clare in the semi-finals, where Limerick will be waiting for the winners of Cork and Tipp. The Leinster Championship draw consists of a qualifier group …
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Episode 13 of our dedicated GAA podcast, The 16th Man, is here! This week the lads discuss Kilkenny’s 36th All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship victory, Galway’s minor success and how it appears to be having little effect on senior accolades thus far as well as reviewing the media coverage of this summer’s championship. This week’s guests include John Fogarty of the …
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The true crisis of the GAA is a bit existential. I know, that’s deep. You’re probably thinking “Oh God, here we go again, another pseudo-intellectual hipster gobshite probably going on about how the GAA is the soul of the Irish or some such twaddle.” Nope. Sorry. The question the GAA is facing is very, very simple. All the talk about …
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There was a strange vein of thought just about visible Sunday night in the aftermath of Galway’s loss to Kilkenny in the Leinster final. As we all know, Joe Canning scored a stunner of a goal in the first half and ended up with 1-9 out of Galway’s total of 2-15. Murmurs of discontent where visible. “Canning could have done …
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Brolly, Spillane and O’Rourke…. RTÉ brought out the big guns to start off this summer’s live coverage of the championship, and it’s fair to say they didn’t let us down. When Joe Brolly, slouched comfortbaly in his chair, brought up the topic of Michael Murphy, it’s fair to say the debate erupted. Although Colm O’Rourke started the disagreement, he looked up …
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In what was an enthralling weekend of football action, John Ivory takes a look at the top three players from the weekend’s All-Ireland Senior Football Championship. _____ 3. Aidan O’Shea – Mayo The Breaffy powerhouse showed once again why he is viewed as one of the best in the business. He got on the ball a huge amount of times and …
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As a passionate Dublin football fan, Gavin Quinn believes no team can stand in the Metropolitans’ way to another All Ireland crown. Nobody. No volunteer will emerge to face the blue wave. The wave is far from breaking, it’s only gathering pace and rising over every rock and boulder that is unfortunate enough to be placed in its path. Laois, Wexford …
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With the Provincial Championships drawing to a close, this weekend sees the start of knockout hurling. This weekend two teams’ championship campaigns will come to an end. Next weekend will see the glamour tie of Tipperary and the losers of Kilkenny and Galway in Thurles, while All Ireland champions Clare will look to bounce back from their disappointing loss to Cork …
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