Articles in the Sports News Category

Group-stage fixtures confirmed for new-look Monaghan championship Colm Shalvey reports Monaghan GAA this week confirmed details for the upcoming club championship schedule. All games in the Senior, Intermediate and Junior Football Championships will be played on Saturdays and Sundays, starting on July 25. There are six games down for decision on that opening day, starting with a trio of 4pm throw-ins: the IFC Group Two openers between Monaghan Harps and Doohamlet and Emyvale and Killanny and the JFC Group One clash of Rockcorry and Oram. The second game in the latter group ...

.Former Donegal GAA star and TG4 Cul Camps TV show coach Kevin Cassidy (photo) was on hand, with his children Aoife, Nia and Fionn, to launch the Kellogg’s GAA Cul Camps on-pack competition. Kellogg-now in its ninth year sponsoring the Kelloggís GAA Cul Camps- has launched the nationwide on-pack promotion for all GAA clubs across the country to be in with a chance to win prizes worth 40,000 euro in their biggest on-pack prize offering ever. SEE PAGE 34 in this week’s Northern Standard.

JOHN GRAHAM The GAA has reversed its position on sanctioning teams who violate the ban on inter-county training before September 14th by potentially disqualifying them from competition. In a sharp escalation a conference call of county officials heard last weekend that such an approach was now being hardened considerably with possible ejection from competitions if counties are found to be training prior to September 14th. Part of the problem would appear to have been that some County team managers were not making the players available to the clubs and that ...

COLM SHALVEY REPORTS The restructured Monaghan GAA championship draws were made at Monday night’s county committee meeting. With the original 2020 club schedule having been ripped up by the lengthy stoppage caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, Monaghan GAA recently introduced a round-robin system which will see each of the three divisions split into two groups of five, with the accelerated return of Gaelic games also seeing the start date brought forward by a week to the last weekend in July. Promoted sides Donaghmoyne and Magheracloone are among three south-Monaghan clubs, along ...

COLM SHALVEY Monaghan GAA Golf Classic tees off July 24th-25th The Monaghan GAA Perpetual Golf Classic, sponsored by McAree Engineering, tees off this year at Rossmore Golf Club on July 24 and 25. This event is running for the seventh year in a row, with Monaghan County Board Chairman Michael Owen McMahon (CIRCLED) saying: “while a lot of things this year have been delayed, our committee and McAree Engineering have been working away in the background to ensure this year’s Golf Classic would go ahead”. “This is going to be ...

Colm Shalvey reports Drumhowan man Noel Duffy completed a marathon undertaking in the early hours of last Saturday morning when he walked his 20th half-marathon this month to round off a virtual trek from his home to Mizen Head in Co Cork, the southernmost point in Ireland. At the time of writing, the money raised was heading towards €15,000 to be split between the Irish Heart Foundation and the Acute Stroke Unit in our Lady of Lourdes hospital, Drogheda; in memory of noel’s mother, Nan Duffy, who died as a result ...

John Graham reports After a 13-week lockdown, the GAA announced that its grounds re-opened yesterday, Wednesday, five days earlier than initially intended. It follows the easing of government restrictions on Friday and the latest recommendations from the Covid-19 advisory Committee. The previous reopening date for clubs was June 29th. From Wednesday, adult teams will be allowed train on a non-contact basis, on the understanding that they follow strict protocols, with minor and all juvenile teams granted permission to return on Saturday. All teams will be allowed to resume full contact training ...

John Graham reports The GAA’s Central Competitions Controls Committee (CCCC) is advancing plans for the inter-county season with the aim of completing it in the same calendar year and finishing out the remaining league games on the first two weekends available, October 17/18 and October 24/25. The Ulster Council has yet to release exact details of their championship schedule, which now incorporates the minor and senior teams playing on the same day. Meanwhile,at local level, Monaghan County Board has set out a plan for an eight weeks time frame to run ...

Colm Shalvey reports Athletics clubs have been stepping up their gradual return to activity in accordance with government guidelines. Athletics Ireland announced their latest protocols last Friday, along with the hope that competitive action may be allowed to resume in the coming months: “The Juvenile and Competition Committees are meeting regularly to plan a return to competition within government guidelines. Provisional dates in August and September are planned for Under-14 groups and above and these will be published in the coming days. Note – all dates will be contingent on meeting ...

COLM SHALVEY Two independent sports shops with a combined history of almost 80 years in Co Monaghan re-opened this week as part of phase two of the Government’s lifting of Ireland’s COVID-19 restrictions. Having been closed since mid-March, McDermott’s Sports Centre in Monaghan Town and Declan Loughman Sports in Castleblayney both opened their doors again on Monday. Dermot McDermott acknowledged: “It’s a relief. Most retailers were closed almost overnight and you didn’t know what the end game was, so for the first month, you’re just taking it a day at a ...