Lads any idea what stand season tickets are allocated to in the pairc for the cork v Limerick. Have a season ticket but want to be in the same stand as a non season ticket holder
Mickey Mouse county board.
At a meeting of the Munster CCC held this evening (Wednesday March 30th), the venue for the Munster Senior Football Semi-Final between Cork and Kerry was discussed. The game was originally fixed for PĂĄirc UĂ Rinn given the unavailability of PĂĄirc UĂ Chaoimh, in the expectation that PĂĄirc UĂ Rinn would hold 15,000 spectators. Following an independent statutory annual health and safety inspection which identified a number of issues at the ground, the capacity was reduced to 9,200 and even If all of the required works are completed on time, the maximum capacity that can be achieved at the venue is 11,000.
Given the average attendance of the last 3 Cork v Kerry matches in the Munster Senior Football Championship held at PĂĄirc UĂ Chaoimh is in excess of 22,000, (not including the Covid restricted match in 2020), Munster Council decided to move the 2022 Munster Semi-Final between the teams to Fitzgerald Stadium Killarney on Saturday May 7th at the earlier start time of 6pm. It is also expected that this game will form a double header with Munster LFGA (further details to follow).
Based on the long-standing home and away agreement between Kerry and Cork, following on from this yearâs game in Killarney, the next two meetings of the counties in the Munster Senior Football Championship will take place at PĂĄirc UĂ Chaoimh. A similar arrangement was successfully used during the recent redevelopment of PĂĄirc UĂ Chaoimh.
Regards,
Bob Ryan
Munster GAA PRO
As a limerick man you couldnât be more correct
The search for bankable conclusions from the league is littered with booby-traps. The general rule of thumb is that good impressions should be treated with scepticism and bad impressions are more likely be true: when a new playerâs limitations are exposed at this time of the year you donât expect to see them sit a repeat exam in the summer.
In Conor Lehaneâs case, though, which rules can be applied? Every season players come back from long terms injuries, or gap years spent travelling, but nobody recovers from being cut from the panel in their late twenties. Do they? Can you think of one?
Less than 16 months ago, Lehaneâs inter-county career appeared to be finished. Was finished. Cork had lost to Waterford and Tipperary in the championship, Lehane had surrendered his place in the starting fifteen, and at the end of the season Kieran Kingston, the Cork manager, knew that if the team was going to grow again, the panel would need to be pruned.
The form of Conor Lehane, left, for Midleton has forced him back in the reckoning for Corkâs all-county panel
KEN SUTTON/INPHO
Some young players were let go, along with a cohort of established names: Anthony Nash, Aidan Walsh, Christopher Joyce and Lehane. There was no uproar when the new panel was announced. All of the above players had been around for so long that it was impossible to imagine better days ahead.
And yet Lehane has come back, better now than at any time in the last five years. If the 2022 All-Stars were being picked before Saturdayâs league final, Lehane would be among the best six forwards in the country.
In many ways this turnaround was unforeseeable. Before he was let go, there was nothing sudden about Lehaneâs loss of form. When Cork were gutted by Kilkenny in the 2019 All-Ireland quarter-final, Lehane was the first Cork player replaced, ten minutes into the second half. When they were beaten by Waterford in the first round of the 2020 championship, 15 months later, he was taken off mid-way through the second half, when it looked like Cork might be over-run.
Lehaneâs performance that day was his Cork career in microcosm: good, bad, absent, infuriating, threatening. He scored two early points, was involved in three other scores, but was on the ball just eight times in 54 minutes. He executed three turnovers, and was mugged for three turnovers, which might sound like he had balanced his personal ledger, but the Waterford half backs were rampant going forward that day and Lehane was part of a feeble first line of resistance.
In that crucial sense Lehane had been part of the problem for years. Cork had consistently fielded forward lines that were laden with ball-players and pace and fine finishers, but were flaky in the essential business of hustling and hounding and winning the ball back. There was an explosiveness about Lehane at his best, but his game had a boom-or-bust quality: he was liable to score from anywhere but he was liable to go missing for long spells too, and Cork could never be sure what they were going to get.
He wasnât in love with gym work during the winter and there were years when various Cork managements believed that he wasnât fit enough. Lehane was a wizard with the ball, but in the modern game brilliance alone has limited purchase.
Lehaneâs comeback has been a tribute to his mental fortitude, an element of his make-up often questioned over the years. When players are let go from inter county panels it is not unusual for managers to promise that theyâll watch their club form; in Lehaneâs case, at his age, it is hard to believe that the pill would have been sugared in that way.
In any case, Lehaneâs club form was stunning and couldnât be ignored. Midleton had been unimpressive in the group stages of the Cork championship last summer, but led by Lehane, they were terrific in the knock-out rounds. In the final three games of Midletonâs run to the county title Lehane scored 0-32, more than a third of it from play. In the county final against Glen Rovers he racked up 13 points and was Man of the Match by a distance.
Kingston had a decision to make: could he leave out the outstanding forward in the Cork championship, or could he risk picking a 29-year-old, who had been knocking around Cork teams for a decade, with no previous history of hard-hitting or tracking back?
It is understood that when Kingston asked him back onto the Cork panel, Lehane requested a meeting before making his decision. There was a risk for him too. The bottom line for both sides, though, was that Lehane needed to change. The tackle-count of Corkâs forward line in the All-Ireland final last August had been pathetic. Cork couldnât entertain a forward that wasnât prepared to fight. Well in Corkâs run to the league final nobody could accuse Lehane of being passive. In every respect, he has been outstanding, with the ball and without it.
It is ten years since Lehane made his debut in the league for Cork against Waterford. That night, just a teenager, he scored seven points from play. Waterford are a different beast now, full of power and aggression. Everything we believe to be true about Lehane in this yearâs league will be tested in Thurles on Saturday night. He knows that too.
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You actually have that backwards⌠The real capital, cork is great, West cork is the 33 rd county and on and on⌠Itâs all insecurity.
The Limerick lads youâve encountered on the INTERNET donât mean/believe a word of it.
Wasnt their a poster on here stating that Lehane was finished?
Heâll win hurler of the year.
What odds. The last one you recommended cost me dear.
I was being sarcastic pal⌠Barry Nash has hurler of the year wrapped up at 66/1.
The smart fellas knew it was only a matter of time before Lehane strode the world of hurling like a colossus.
A 30 year old Lehane still has twice the wrists and hurling brain of any young forward coming through in the country.
Wouldnât you expect that of a fella with a decade of experience in hand?
Fierce explaining altogetherâŚ
Signing in.
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What difference does it make where they play it? Itâs not as if they are going to beat Kerry anyway.
They moved the game themselves from Pairc ui Chaoimh for financial reasons.
Now they are complaining because itâs being moved from Pairc ui Rinn for financial reasons.
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