Lot of close links between the cricket and hurling communities in the South East. The Rackards were first and foremost a cricketing family, before they ever discovered hurling.
Cricket was very popular in County Kilkenny. I’d recommend Michael Joyce’s, The Forgotten Game, The History of Cricket in County Kilkenny. A tremendous read.
Bagenalstown one of the oldest cricket clubs in the island and for years, one of the only non Dublin clubs to play in the Leinster Senior League.
Wasn’t there a story of one of the rackards getting sent off with christy ring and they going behind the stand and having a bout of queensbury rules?..
One of the junior clubs started this thing a week ago where their players aimed (individually) to run 5 or 10k, to add up to 500k in a day, all within a 2km zone. They raised over €10,000 and challenged other Clubs in Laois to do so. Nearly every club has taken it up.
The DOITFORDAN fundraising is said to have passed 1 million Euro in a month. It’s an astonishing achievement.
They have an online lip sync battle tonight. Davy, Evanne and a few others judging it. Amazing effort.