“A bleak farce that leaves everyone feeling bitter and betrayed.” So writes Ken Early of Ireland’s game against Israel in Debrecen on Sunday evening. Once again, “the country marvelled at the incompetence of the FAI” in the build-up to it all. Despite having seven months to prepare for the occasion, he says, the question of whether the game would actually be played was still not settled the day before.
But the FAI president, Paul Cooke, insisted that the association “handled the week quite well”, questioning how “some people conducted themselves”. Who? The media. “I thought journalists were meant to be balanced and reflect two sides of an opinion,” Gavin Cooney heard him say. “I haven’t seen that.”
Gavin reflects on a week the Irish players “thought might never have an end”, such was the “furious, rancorous contention as to whether the game should start at all”. It did, and as Gavin Cummiskey puts it, “it felt like one of those miserable lockdown occasions from five years ago when only the media and a handful of punters inhabited a cavernous venue”.
“Why have Russia been banned by Uefa and Fifa, but Israel has not,” Denis Walsh asks, that just one of a number of examples he offers to prove that sport has no “moral code”, sportswashing “Saudi money” another.
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Back home, Shelbourne scuppered Athlone Town’s hopes of back-to-back league and cup doubles when they beat them 3-1 in the women’s FAI Cup final on Saturday. A devastating first-half display by the Dublin club, which gave them a 3-0 lead at half time, all but decided the final by the break.
In rugby, how did the opening weekend of the URC go for Irish clubs? Not great. All four of them lost. Connacht and Ulster were downed, respectively, by the Stormers and Edinburgh on Friday evening, and Leinster and Munster lost out to the Lions and Glasgow Warriors come Saturday. You can read all the match reports and reaction here.
On a happier note, Ireland’s women got the better of Japan in Galway in their WXV Series meeting, Gerry Thornley reporting on a game that saw local heroine Béibhinn Parsons become her country’s record try scorer.
David Gorman, meanwhile, reports on Conor McKenna becoming the first Irish player to win two AFL Premiership titles after his Brisbane Lions side got the better of Fremantle Dockers in the Grand Final in Melbourne.
In Gaelic games, Paul Keane writes about the (possible) end of Shane O’Donnell’s career, the Clare great exiting his county’s hurling championship after Éire Óg’s defeat by Inagh-Kilnamona.
In racing, Brian O’Connor looks back on a fruitful weekend for Billy Lee, his win on Trean in the Goffs Million pushing him ever closer to a first champion jockey title. And Brian also has word on the shape of the Irish challenge in Sunday’s €5 million Qatar Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe, Europe’s richest race.
TV Watch: TG4 has highlights from the GAA club weekend (7.30pm), and at 7.45pm you can pick from Belgium v France (Virgin Media Two) and Northern Ireland v Hungary (BBC 1) in football’s Nations League.
