Mediaboss Marketing

THE inequitable phase of the Football Championship is nigh. Those handicapped by superiority in their own province take up the obligatory brace position for whatever hurtles out of the Qualifier tunnel toward them.

In the case of Connacht champions Galway, the sight of Kieran McGeeneys Armagh coming down the tracks may resemble more an oncoming train than something light and bendable. It might be twenty years since they upended Kerry in an All-Ireland final for a maiden Sam Maguire, but McGeeneys squad have a critical pre-requisite heading to the big smoke in a fortnight battle-hardened momentum.

The Orchard have undressed Tyrone and Donegal on successive weekends and carries the sort of beneficial freight to Croke Park in a fortnight that Cork, Clare or even Mayo have not magicked up. The 3-17 to 0-16 defeat of Donegal in Clones on Sunday was every bit as resounding as it reads.

Theyve also kicked over the traces of Ulster tradition and shaped a new order. Derry and Armagh look like theyre future-proofing while Donegal, Monaghan and even Tyrone look jaded and samey.

Monday's quarter-final draw has delivered the sort of lop-sided draw that will have Galway, Armagh, Derry and Clare salivating at the very real chance of a road to the All-Ireland final.

On the other side, the winners of Kerry and Mayo will expect to walk into Dublin in the All-Ireland semi-final. For Jack O'Connor's charges, Mayo is precisely the game they need to jumpstart their competitive batteries - but it is laced with trouble. Unquestionably, Mayo will bring the heat and lean on their gut checks against Monaghan and Kildare while also planning to test the pulse of the Kerry keeper and full-back line. Neither has been properly scrutinised this season. Whoever emerges should, at least, be better braced for whatever Dublin or Cork have coming down the line.

Munster, the weakest province for many, provided more quarter-finalists than any other and though Cork and Clare must deny it, they are both in a place now where the last eight ensures an upbeat appraisal of their season. Whereas Cork have landed the draw from hell in Dublin - given Derry and Galway were the other possibilities - the Banner will have learned from their League undressing by Derry and will be all the better for it this time around. If Armaghs dismantling of Declan Bonners side was the standout statement of the qualifiers, Clares win over Roscommon on Saturday at Croke Park was the head-turner, and it also worked 70-odd valuable Jones Road minutes into their legs and minds.

The manager Colm Collins carries the gait of a man utterly unfussed by the constant facility to sidestep what used be termed conventional wisdom. As Paul Keane details elsewhere on these pages, Collins has won 50% of his championship games since 2014 and made a pair of All-Ireland quarter-finals.

Is it unrealistic to think that Cork can live with Dublin for over seventy minutes in Croke Park? Probably. Captain Brian Hurley wasnt having any mention of bonus territory after their unconvincing 2-18 to 1-16 win over Limerick at Pirc Ui Chaoimh on Sunday, even if the five-point victory did suggest that footballs upheaval in the county is eventually starting to subside. But Dublin are in another orbit to Limerick.

Manager John Cleary belongs to a time when Cork trips to Croke Park were an every-year occurrence but right now they should be chewed to the marrow. The great deficit of their 2020 Munster final defeat to Tipperary after catching Kerry was losing the experience and value of an All-Ireland semi-final against Mayo. Not since the same opposition pipped them by a point in 2014, have they played a knockout game at Croke Park.

Billy Lees Limerick kept them honest, and then some, for the greatest part on Sundays Round 2 Qualifier, and only when the visitors lost Gordon Brown to a black card did Cork add 1-3 in a hurry to put daylight between the sides. A Brian Donovan goal on the hour had made it a three-point game, 1-15 to 1-12, before Corks Kevin ODonovan was felled for a penalty converted by Hurley.

We played Derry and Galway in the League, beaten seven or eight points, but we were not totally outclassed, reflected Cleary. We think we are after improving a good bit in the meantime, we have players back that we didn't have then, and not alone would we be having a shot at it, we would hope to be very competitive and with a chance of winning it.

For a county like Cork, with the players we have at our disposal, that should be a minimum. We are there now and we want to play in an All-Ireland semi-final after a quarter-final. We'll leave no stone unturned in the next two weeks to try and get there.

By their league ranking, Cork are around 14th best in the country, one behind Clare. But after the upheaval of a torrid League, as Cleary described it, and the loss of manager Keith Ricken, not to mention a swathe of squad departures, there is a welcome quietness around the camp now.

Weve been stuttering away, for want of a better word, and now what we are looking at is trying to beat whats in front of us. We wanted to back up Louth and put back-to-back wins together but were under no illusions, were really in the frying pan now.

Though he had a quiet afternoon generally, Cathail OMahonys 45th-minute run and goal underlined the potency of an inside line completed by Hurley and Stephen Sherlock that again chipped in with 2-10.

Billy Lee wore the hangdog look of a man afterwards whod seen a glorious window of opportunity snap shut on his forefinger. Reminding him that Limerick are top 12 in the country and preparing for Division 2 in 2023 could be interpreted as patronising, however relevant for context. Hell only have to look out the Ennis Road to see what might have been.

That ten minutes with the black card, we suffered badly, thats our own fault, but it slipped away from us there, he acknowledged. Weve work to do for Division 2 next year but we are bitterly disappointed now. Four, five-point losses wont be any good to us in 2023. We have to find a way to get over the line in matches.

I backed these lads after the Munster final on live television when we didnt do ourselves justice, but I didnt have any doubt that theyd step up and compete against Cork. Where these lads have come from, ranked 31st or 32nd in the country, to where they are now, you have to have serious courage to do that. We might never win All-Irelands but there isnt a team in the country would have done what those lads have. It would have been easier to walk away.

A version of Lees Limerick met Galways second string the Thursday after the Munster and Connacht finals, but in terms of foreign prep, its been slim pickings for the four provincial winners ahead of their quarter-finals. How they have managed the interregnum will make or break their summers and in that respect, Jack O'Connor has priceless experience. Kerry have eschewed the possibility of a game since May 28, instead opting for their favoured quiet camp at Fota Island in Cork last weekend. Similarly, Dublin and Derry have been keeping it in house though all made trips to Croke Park and Clones this weekend to study the form.

The qualifier system is headed for the dirt nap if administrators have their way and not many provincial winners will weep its demise. Ditto provincial final losers. Statistics indicate that three out of four beaten finalists lose next time this weekend it was a full house of all four for the first time in 12 years Roscommon, Donegal, Kildare and Limerick. Is it the difficulty of recharging batteries? Or overcoming disappointment? Or an issue with drained confidence?

It won't bother Armagh or Mayo, nor Cork or Clare, who all have back-to-back wins. With two weeks to refuel and refocus, the quartet of football championship qualifiers have no drag to be bothering them - and the win that momentum delivers in their sails.

See original here:
The Last Eight: Kerry have the All-Ireland quarter-final they need - even if it's mined with trouble - Irish Examiner

For Jimmy OBrien, there was little solace to be taken in the fact that he stood up and was counted on the biggest day of a burgeoning career in Marseille.

My girlfriend tried telling me that as well, the Kildare native shrugged when it was put to him that he had a good game against La Rochelle last Saturday.

I told her I would have taken playing the worst game of my career if we had won and I would have taken a red card, doing everything bad, missing every tackle, dropping every ball if we had just won.

Its very, very difficult.

Its been a brilliant year for a player once tipped for big things by Isa Nacewa and despite his disappointment, he has his hand firmly in the air for selection for tomorrows United Rugby Championship final eight clash with Glasgow Warriors at the RDS.

Its been a tough week around Leinsters UCD base, but theyve been using their hurt as motivation for taking down the Scots and booking their space in the finalfour.

We still have the URC to play for, its a knockout game, a quarter-final at home, so it is still an exciting game to play in and everyones looking forward to it, OBrien said.

I hadnt really played knockout rugby for Leinster up until this season so, yeah, I really want to play in these big games and hopefully we still have three big knockout games to come, starting this weekend against Glasgow.

Id love to play in it, theyre still massive games and Id love to play in another final and try to win one.

Theyre a very good side; tough to play against.

The one game that stands out in my mind is that Rainbow Cup game last year when we were over there and they beat us.

They really got into us and got a good win out of it and that really p***ed us off, we were very frustrated.

Long-term, OBriens focus is already on next season and going one step further in the Champions Cup.

You kind of have to remember how you felt right after it in the changing room and use that for next season, he said.

Didnt the final get announced for the Aviva next year, thats even another motivation, to get to the final at home.

Were just going to have to try to use the pain.

Continue reading here:
'My girlfriend tried telling me that as well' - Good final performance no consolation for Jimmy O'Brien - Independent.ie

WHEN HE WAS left out of Irelands squad for the Six Nations in January, Ulster out-half Billy Burns was brutally honest when asked to reflect on losing his place in the international set-up.

I was disappointed but I probably dont warrant my selection at the moment, he told BBC Sport Northern Ireland in early February. Im still trying to get that consistency week on week, to back up my performances.

Since then hes got the consistency part right, starting all but two of Ulsters games from the start of the Six Nations to the present day and leading the line against the likes of Leinster and Toulouse, and then in big United Rugby Championship games against Edinburgh and the Cell C Sharks.

Burns form played a big part in helping the province secure a home quarter-final in the URC tonight against Munster [KO 7.35pm, live on Premier Sports 2, TG4] and, despite the temptation to move Mike Lowry to stand-off or bring in the experience of Ian Madigan, it has been the former Gloucester man who has been consistently relied upon by head coach Dan McFarland.

Whether Andy Farrell has seen enough to bring him back into the Ireland fold for the upcoming tour of New Zealand is yet to be seen, but he has surely done enough to at least warrant being back in the conversation. But impressing the national coach isnt the main goal for Burns himself, hes only interested in the man in the mirror.

Personally Ive been really happy this year Ive been able to put back-to-back performances in, says the 27-year-old.

Thats been a real issue since I came to the club in terms of picking up little injuries, but this year is the first year where Ive been able to play 80 minutes in games as much as I can. From doing that, Im more comfortable on the pitch, I feel like Im seeing pictures on pitch quicker and being able to react quicker.

In terms of my form, yeah, Im doing okay. Im hard on myself, Im my own harshest critic, but I just focus on doing my job to the best of my ability and getting results at the weekend. I feel Im in a good position but theres still definitely room for improvement.

Of course, given the nature of tonights game being an inter-pro and with someone who will be competing with him for a place on that plane opposing him in Joey Carbery, the usual head-to-head storyline is rolled out. But, once again, thats something that Burns is not concerning himself with.

Joeys someone Ive worked with a lot in Ireland camp and learned a lot off. I think hes a great player. But I tend not to look much into playing for international spots because its probably an added pressure I dont need. I put enough pressure on myself to perform well, he adds.

So, with the pressure taken off the individual battle, the focus shifts to the war as a whole and the fight to make it into the URC semi-finals at Kingspan Stadium this evening, with neither side willing to see their seasons end in the first week of June.

For Ulster, the fear that both their domestic and European campaigns could come to an end on home soil is a very real one. After being beaten by Toulouse in Belfast, which knocked them out of the Heineken Champions Cup at the last-16 stage, there is a powerful motivating factor for them not to do likewise in the URC.

Ulster take on Munster in Belfast tonight. Source: Dan Sheridan/INPHO

Understandably, drawing on that gut-wrenching disappointment against the French giants is at the forefront of the mind this week and making sure they dont repeat that feat against their southern cousins. Fortunately, there is plenty they can use.

I genuinely feel like we prepared well for that game. Weve got a lot of guys who have been around the squad for a long time and we all know you dont get these knockout games at home very often. We didnt handle the occasion well, I think we went into our shell a bit in that second leg and that might have punished us late in that second game, recalls Burns.

We learned a lot. There were a few things that didnt go our way on the night. Probably over the two legs, we didnt make the most of the period when they were down a man over there, we probably didnt build ourselves a big enough lead even though we backed ourselves to get the job done at home.

We learned huge amounts in terms of how we approach games. Win or lose, you learn something every week, but this is our first knockout game since then so well see if weve learned those lessons. Hopefully those hard lessons weve learned, as hard as they were, we can turn those learnings into a good result.

A good result would set up a semi-final away to either the DHL Stormers or Edinburgh, but first they need to overcome a Munster side that already have experience of triumphing at Kingspan Stadium having caught Ulster flat-footed after that Toulouse disappointment at the tail end of April.

Get closer to the stories that matter with exclusive analysis, insight and debate in The42 Membership.

Indeed, at that time there were fears that Ulsters season could completely go off the rails and that they had simply run out of steam, but they recovered well with wins over Edinburgh and the Sharks, and Burns insists they are peaking at just the right time for a play-off run.

We still have plenty left in the tank, he maintains.

Our season has gone up and down a bit. We probably played our best rugby around Christmas-time and around the start of the New Year, and then we had a dip around when we went to South Africa. We learned a lot of lessons from those games, and obviously in Europe as well.

The Sharks game was nowhere near perfect but we were back on trend a bit, and we have to be at our best this weekend because theyre a top quality team.

Get instant updates on your province on The42 app. With Laya Healthcare, official health and wellbeing partner to Leinster, Munster and Connacht Rugby.

See original here:
'We still have plenty left in the tank' - Burns braced for Munster challenge - The42

Zach Diewert, right, and Southeastern teammates Thomas Broyles, middle, an outfielder, and Stephen Cullen, left, an infielder. (Photo submitted)

Southeastern only two wins away from taking the NAIA title

Chemainus Zach Diewert and his Southeastern University teammates are just two wins away from potentially becoming National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics World Series baseball champions.

Related story: Diewert bound for NAIA college baseball World Series

Top-seeded Southeastern University Fire is in Lewiston, Idaho where the team has won the first three games of the tournament to reach the final four.

Southeastern overcame a 6-0 deficit in the opening game Saturday against Georgia Gwinnett and prevailed 9-7 with two runs in the bottom of the ninth inning. Diewert got into the game as a pinch runner and scored a run.

Southeastern then also trailed 3-2 in the fifth inning Monday before rallying to beat LSU Shreveport 8-4. Diewert had one at-bat as a pinch hitter, but struck out.

The latest action was Tuesday when Southeastern broke open a 3-3 tie with two runs in the fifth and three in the sixth en route to a 9-5 triumph against host Lewis-Clark State of Idaho. Diewert did not see any action in that game.

Next game is Wednesday night when the two undefeated teams in the double knockout event square off, with Southeastern facing No. 2 Tennessee Wesleyan at 6:30 p.m. Pacific Time. Lewis-Clark State meets LSU Shreveport Wednesday afternoon in a knockout game.

Southeastern now sports a remarkable 57-3 record for the season. Tennessee Wesleyan is 56-7.

BaseballCollegeLocal Sports

Sign up for a free account today, and receive top headlines in your inbox Monday to Saturday.

Excerpt from:
Diewert and teammates close in on World Series baseball title - Chemainus Valley Courier

GARY BENNETT wants Wrexham to come flying out of the blocks when his former club kick-off a 15th season in non-league.

The Reds promotion dream came to an end on Saturday following a heartbreaking 5-4 defeat against Grimsby Town in the play-off semi-final at The Racecourse.

After making a slow start to the campaign, Wrexham were one of the divisions in-form teams following the turn of the year and took the title race down to the final round of fixtures before finishing runners-up behind champions Stockport County.

Wrexham legend Bennett wants his former club to recapture that form from the start when the 2022-23 National League season kicks off on Saturday August 6.

We have got to hit the ground running next season, said Bennett.

We got off to a sluggish start this season and with only one team going up, we have got to make sure we start off like we did at the back end of the season.

You cant afford to get off to a sluggish start or flat patches, you have got to hit the ground running.

Poor defending proved to be Wrexhams downfall in the knockout game with Grimsby scoring the winner with one minute left in extra-time.

I am not going to tell Phil Parkinson his job because he has done a great job, said Bennett.

He will know it needs a little bit of tinkering and maybe we need to bring a midfielder in and sort it out at the back because some of the goals we conceded against Grimsby were poor.

It was poor defending but I will put all that down to the game being what it was - a one-off semi-final, full-house at The Racecourse.

It was just one of those mad games that every now and again you are involved in, it was just unfortunate we were on the wrong end of it.

Bennett added: With the team we have got we are always going to score goals.

A play-off semi-final, the game was unreal - you dont expect 5-4.

End-to-end, lots of goals and the referees performance left a lot to be desired.

There were some strange decisions, even the late goal that Grimsby scored he was marking the pitch to get the yards from throwing the ball - I have never seen that in all my time watching football, it was bizarre."

Bennett expected Grimsby, who beat Notts County 2-1 after extra-time in the play-off eliminator last Monday, to fade when the clash with Wrexham finished 4-4 inside 90 minutes.

"That is football, it is small margins. Unluckily it didn't fall for us," said Bennett.

"Respect to Grimsby they played Monday and we had a week off, when we went to extra-time I thought they would tire but they didn't, they kept going to the end.

"Good luck to Grimsby but from a Wrexham point of view, absolutely devastated."

See the original post here:
Wrexham legend Gary Bennett reflects on play-off heartbreak - The Leader