With the Irish (and British) Lions tour of Australia three-ish months away, Andy Farrell now has his coaching team in place, Nathan Johns reporting on confirmation that Simon Easterby, John Fogarty and Andrew Goodman are all joining him from the Irish set-up. That leaves Paul O’Connell minding the Irish house, so he’ll take charge of the summer tour of Georgia and Portugal. “Eyebrows will be raised at so many of the Ireland backroom team joining the Lions equivalent,” writes Gerry Thornley, the upside being that O’Connell and his assistants will gain no little experience.
Meanwhile, the provinces are fine-tuning their preparations for the weekend’s URC games, Gerry talking to Connacht’s Caolin Blade ahead of the meeting with Munster in Castlebar on Saturday and John O’Sullivan hearing from Robbie Henshaw in the build-up to Leinster’s game against the Sharks in Durban.
In Gaelic games, Gordon Manning gets the latest from the Kerry and Mayo camps as they shape up for Sunday’s Division One League final, hearing from Paul Geaney and Aidan O’Shea.
While the bulk of the league focus has been on football and the new rules - “everyone’s been two-point arcing, 4v3-ing, soloing and going, and all manner of things besides” - Ciarán Murphy has a notion that hurling, put in the shade for a month or two, “will not be taking that lying down”.
Anomalies remain around the awarding of Sport Ireland grants
As the FAI and League of Ireland clubs squabble, our talented young players are moulded into professionals abroad
Gerry Thornley: Andy Farrell’s choice of Lions coaches shows he will do things his own way
The 2026 World Cup, heralded as a uniter, is facing divisive road blocks
In soccer, Muireann Duffy profiles the Irish under-17 squad that made history on Tuesday by qualifying for November’s World Cup in Qatar, and in golf, Philip Reid previews the Houston Open where Rory McIlroy will be making his first appearance since 2014. And Ian O’Riordan has news of an increase in funding for our high performance athletes, with 29 being granted the maximum amount.
And in his America at Large column, Dave Hannigan reflects on the life and times of sportswriter and author John Feinstein who died earlier this month. He had a “unique knack for lifting the veil on everything from professional golf to college basketball, tennis to the NFL”, and along the way, he developed a quirky relationship with none other than Johan Cruyff.
TV Watch: Rory McIlroy heads a field that also includes Séamus Power and Pádraig Harrington at the Houston Open (Sky Sports Golf, from 12.30pm), and come 11pm tonight the same channel has coverage from the LPGA Ford Championship in Arizona where Leona Maguire will be in action. In between, it’s Barcelona (4) v Wolfsburg (1) (TNT Sports 3, 5.45) and Chelsea (0) v Manchester City (2) (TNT Sports 1, 8pm) in the second leg of the women’s Champions League quarter-finals.
