A rare quiet weekend, as Laura Hayes honoured for May

It could very well be described as the calm before the storm it’s a relatively quiet weekend, unless of course you are dealing with tickets for the big one on Sunday week!

The focus is very much on the finals in the county hurling leagues with all 7 down for decision.

Laura wins May award

It has been a very successful few weeks for the Cork senior camogie team as they recovered from not making the league final and have embarked on an impressive unbeaten run.

In that period, they regained the Munster title and progressed directly into the All-Ireland semi-final in which they will play Dublin on Saturday 27 July at 1.15pm in Nowlan Park.

A key player in that exciting run has been Laura Hayes, a dynamic midfielder whose pace has caused endless problems for a variety of teams and in recognition of this, the St Catherine’s player was recently presented with the 96FM/C103 Sports Star of the month award for May in association with the Rochestown Park Hotel.

Laura was thrilled to be honoured and said: “It has been exciting few weeks for the team and we are really playing well; bit slow starting back after last year’s win, but now we are heading into the real business end of the championship and we are really looking forward to the next few weeks.”

The depth of the squad and players returning from injury has also helped. “Without a doubt, everyone on the panel is fighting for their place and that makes it very competitive in training which is what exactly what we want.”

As for the award, Laura said she was “absolutely delighted to be acknowledged and I owe to the players and the management for all the work they put into the team, and my thanks to both 96FM/C103 and the Rochestown Park Hotel for this”.

Cork County GAA Board PRO Francis Kenneally congratulated Laura. “It’s a well deserved award and having seen the team play in recent weeks it is clear that you are determined to retain the All-Ireland and I wish you all well, and of course our thanks to the sponsors for their continued promotion of these prestigious awards.”

On another note Francis said: “It has been a difficult week for Glen Rovers Camogie with the sad passing of one of their young players Sara Kate O’Mara and on behalf of the board, our sympathies to her family and colleagues in Glen Rovers.”

Tom Tobin of Rochestown Park Hotel also congratulated Laura and wished her and the Cork Camogie team continued success in the upcoming championship.

Marion McCarthy represented the Cork Camogie, team manager Ger Manley and players Meabh Cahalane and Emma Murphy were in attendance along with family and players and officers from St Catherine’s Camogie Club.

Since then, Cork with an emphatic win over Galway secured their direct route into the semi-final.

Galway and Tipperary meet in the other semi-final at 3pm.

Cork also are into the semi-final in the Intermediate Championship but their opponents won’t be known until after the quarter-finals this weekend.

Interestingly the semi-final is also down for Saturday 27 in Thurles; hopefully common sense will apply with the time for this game and allow sufficient time for officials to make the short journey from Kilkenny.

On Sunday, the Under 16 A team are in their All-Ireland when they play Galway in Mallow at 4pm.

Ladies football

The race for the title in the TG4 All-Ireland Senior Championship was really thrown wide open on Saturday when Galway dumped the reigning champions Dublin out and in Parnell Park at that.

It all means they now face Cork who were comfortable and impressive winners over Waterford earlier in the day, in the semi-final on Saturday 20 July in O’Connor Park Tullamore with a 5.15pm throw-in.

It will be the 3rd meeting between the teams this season, Cork have won both and certainly as a team they are growing in confidence.

Kerry and Armagh meet in the 2nd semi-final at 7.30pm.

County hurling league finals

The football finals were completed last week and this weekend the 7 hurling finals are scheduled and thankfully no Cork players are involved and I say that content in the knowledge that we have an All-Ireland Final to look forward to.

Manager Pat Ryan might though allow some players play if he feels they might need game time especially, if one or two lads were coming back from injury.

There should be some interesting games played and with the championship around the corner, clubs will be keen to build some momentum.

Páirc Uí Rinn is the venue for the Division 1 and 2 deciders, both at 7pm. On Thursday Carrigaline go in chase of the double having won the football last week when they meet St Finbarr’s in the D2 Final.

On Saturday it’s Sars v Charleville in the Division 1 final, with the county champions bidding to retain their title.

Two other finals on Saturday - an all-East Cork encounter in D4, Lisgoold v Russell Rovers at 3pm in Castlemartyr, while in D5 at 5pm its Watergrasshill v Tracton in Mayfield.

Sunday will see the remaining 3 finals decided. At 1pm in Bandon, it’s Kinsale v Ballinascarthy in D7, while in D6 Erin’s Own v Kilbrittain is in Ballincolllig. In D3 Ballygarvan is the venue for the all Carrigdhoun clash of Valley Rovers and Ballymartle - both games at 2pm.

Mentioning championship, it was disappointing to hear at the last County Board meeting that the CCCC have decided that Super Valu Páirc Uí Chaoimh will not be used for quarter-finals, citing ‘lack of atmosphere’ as the reason.

This is in my opinion a poor decision as all players strive to play in the stadium, and I am sure they would not be troubled by the ‘atmosphere’. When you are at the business end of the championship you want to play in the best and the ‘Park is the best, maybe this might be looked at nearer the dates.

After all if professional teams like Munster Rugby and the Ireland ladies soccer teams can play there and I stress I have no issues with this decision, surely the amateur hurler and footballer should be afforded the same facility.

Magical Sunday in Croke Park

Cast your mind back to Sunday 28 April; Cork 3-24 Clare 3-26, Cork pointless after 2 games and looking at another summer without championship hurling.

Fast forward to Sunday 7 July; Cork 1-28 Limerick 0-29, the 5 in a row dream is over and it’s Pat Ryan’s men who are heading back to Croke Park on Sunday 21 July for the All-Ireland Hurling Final v Clare.

Ironically Cork beat Limerick twice in the year, while Clare lost to John Kiely’s side twice, small margins and twists and turns aplenty en route to the final.

Patrick Horgan passed the 700 point mark and can go ahead of TJ Reid with a few more on Sunday week, even if it did take him longer then he would have hoped for to reach that mark, when did he last fail to score in the 1st half of any match, another record maybe?

Cork were outstanding last Sunday especially in the 3rd quarter when they did to Limerick what Limerick have done to others so often in the last five years.

There are aspects of the game that they will look at but for now the focus is very much on ending the long wait for the famous cup to return to Leeside.

All credit to Pat Ryan - the media duties were completed on Monday night in Super Valu Páirc Uí Chaoimh, Simply Suits kitted the team out, and there was a nice gathering for the family members upstairs afterwards as a thank you for their support. A word on Limerick; they were outstanding champions - set the bar for others to attain, and as ever were gracious in defeat particularly John Kiely who accepted the loss in the very same manner he rejoiced in winning; the sign of a really decent individual as I discovered on the occasions I interviewed him.

Will he be back next year? The news that he is taking a career break from his vice-principal role was interesting and with Paul Kinnerk bound for the USA with work, we may very well have seen the last of this impressive duo.

Now if I could only think of something to fill next week’s column!!!