JJ Hanrahan has never played in Páirc Uí Chaoimh, and the last time he was even in the place was for an Ed Sheeran concert. On Saturday, though, it’ll be business rather than pleasure at the venue when Munster take on Gloucester in the Champions Cup, Hanrahan and his teammates, a week on from that 40-14 beating by Bath, hell-bent on putting “a profoundly disappointing” start to the campaign behind them. Gerry Thornley talks to the 33-year-old.
Jack Conan wasn’t too happy either with Leinster’s Champions Cup opener, but they did at least pick up a win against Harlequins. “That wasn’t good enough last week,” John O’Sullivan heard him say of the performance, Conan hoping for an improvement in Friday’s game away to Leicester Tigers.
And with an eye to the future, John picks out three young centres who are knocking on the door for Ireland, Hugh Gavin, Jude Postlethwaite and Dan Kelly, all of whom have had bright starts to the season with their clubs.
In soccer, James McDermott previews Shelbourne’s Conference League meeting with Crystal Palace in Tallaght this evening with Paul O’Hehir talking to Shels manager Joey O’Brien about the challenge. And Paul also heard from Stephen Bradley ahead of Shamrock Rovers’ must-win trip to Iceland to take on Breidablik in the same competition.
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In Gaelic games, Ciarán Murphy rates last Sunday’s Munster final between Dingle and St Finbarr’s as one of the best games of the year, but while it proved that “the new rules have improved the game out of sight”, it also provided further evidence that “they’re not perfect”.
Gordon Manning, meanwhile, talks to St Ergnat’s Maria O’Neill in the build-up to Saturday’s All-Ireland club football final when her team will become the first from Antrim to reach this stage of the competition. It’s a big ask for them, though - their opponents are the five-in-a-row-seeking Kilkerrin-Clonberne from Galway.
Sunday’s camogie final pairs Galway’s Athenry and Cork’s St Finbarr’s, Athenry driven by the memory of their former player Kate Moran who died in 2022 after suffering a head injury while playing a league game for the team. “She’s always someone that’s going to be a part of Athenry camogie,” Dervla Higgins tells Gordon.
And in his America at Large column, Dave Hannigan writes about the disappearance last month of a high school football coach, Travis Turner not seen since he took to the woods behind his home. “Increasingly macabre speculation swirls about what may have befallen him,” the fact that he has been charged in absentia with the possession of child abuse imagery adding to it. “Another so-called hero with feet of clay,” says Dave.
TV Watch: Shamrock Rovers and Shelbourne are in Conference League action today, Rovers away to Iceland’s Breidablik at 5.45 (Premier Sports 1 and TNT Sports 4), Shels at home to Crystal Palace at 8.0 (Premier Sports 1 and TNT Sports 3). Your Europa League offerings include Utrecht v Nottingham Forest (5.45) and Basel v Aston Villa (8.0), both on TNT Sports 1, and also at 8.0 Celtic host Evan Ferguson’s Roma (TNT Sports 2).
