The first international inter-varsity athletics meet between the University of Limerick and University of Birmingham and the American Ivy League giants, Harvard and Yale, will take place at the University of Limerick Bowl on June 16th. The chief organiser, Michael Hayes, explained that every fourth year since 1895, the combined track and field teams of Harvard and Yale competed in Britain against the athletes of Cambridge and Oxford. "I think it is important to highlight for students from Harvard, and Yale and indeed from other prestigious American universities, that there are other top universities on this side of the Atlantic apart from Oxford and Cambridge." UL will have at least five current senior Irish internationals in their squad.

Strong wind and rain failed to prevent some exciting action at the IAAF Grand Prix in Bratislava last night with the 110m hurdle producing a great battle between Britain's Tony Jarrett and Tony Dees of the United States. Jarrett took the honours in a time of 13.49s, three hundredths of a second ahead of Dees with Slovakia's Igor Kovac in third. Greece's Paraskevi Tsiamit won the women's triple jump competition with a jump of 14.66m at her second attempt to beat Bulgaria's Tereza Marinova and Russia's Elena Lebedenko. Spain's Jose Antonio Redolat sprang a surprise in the men's 1,500m in a time of 3:47.34, ahead of Piotr Rostkowski of Poland and Briton John Mayock.

Canada's world 100m record holder Donovan Bailey is set to make his official return to competition after being out injured for virtually nine months at an athletics meeting in Nuremberg, Germany, next Sunday, it was revealed yesterday. The 31-year-old, who broke the record with his 1996 Olympic gold medal winning run of 9.84secs, had a gentle run-out to test the Achilles tendon, which he tore playing basketball last September, on Friday in Houston Texas finishing fifth in 10.5 secs. Bailey, whose main ambition this year is to regain the world title in Seville in August which he lost to American and bitter rival Maurice Greene in 1997, told the Toronto Sun that he had not felt any pain in his tendon. After Nuremberg Bailey, who was a stockbroker prior to becoming an athlete, will compete in the Canadian championships in Winnipeg, from June 25th-27th, and then the PanAmerican Games in the same city from July 23rd to August 8th.

Gaelic Games

Offaly (IHC v Kilkenny): E Kennedy; R Devery, J Doughan, J Coakley; D Murphy, R Mannion, N Claffey; M Rigney, J Guinan; D Pilkington, D Regan, T Spain; C Gath, an other, J Kinsella.

Golf

County Louth's Deirdre Smith led the Irish challenge in the first strokeplay qualifying round of the British Women's Open Amateur Golf championship at Royal Birkdale on the Lancashire coast yesterday. Smith kept calm in difficult windy conditions to return a 79 score bettered by only 13 players in the 140 strong field. That total meant she was just four strokes behind first round leader Candy Hannemann an 18-year-old Brazilian currently studying at college in America. Irish champion Claire Coughlan, a teenager from Cork and Jennifer Gannon from County Louth kept themselves well on course to secure one of the qualifying spots in the knock-out phase when they returned 80s, while two other Irish players Alison Coffey and Oonagh Purfield could well also make progress. Defending champion, Kim Andrew meanwhile made a solid start to her bid for back to back victories when she returned a 78.

Motor Sport

Scotland's Colin McRae was forced to pull out of the Acropolis Rally yesterday because of a faulty gear box while Englishman Richard Burns regained the overall lead. Former world champion McRae, driving a Ford Focus, finished the 15th special stage three minutes ahead of series co-leader Tommi Makinen of Finland, but was unable to start the 16th stage when his gears jammed. McRae finished yesterday's first stage as overall leader in the rally - the eighth leg in the World Championships. Burns, who was penalised 30 seconds for returning to the garage too late yesterday, fared better than his Finnish team-mate Juha Kankkunen as the four-time world champion, who won the Argentinian Rally last month, retired with a broken axle on the 11th special stage. Burns, who led for most of the race on Monday before deliberately taking a 30-second penalty so he would not have to lead off yesterday regained the lead in the afternoon session after Makinen, who is seeking a fourth-consecutive world title, had replaced McRae in the lead. And Burns ended the second day out in front, with a 17.2-second cushion over Spain's Carlos Sainz (Toyota) and 35 seconds over Makinen (Mitsubishi).

Soccer

World Cup winning midfielder Emmanuel Petit will be called upon by the English Football Association (FA) to explain his claims yesterday that some top footballers take drugs. FA spokesman Steve Double confirmed earlier comments by Chief executive of the Professional Footballers' Association (PFA) Gordon Taylor that they would be looking into the matter. "If he has any evidence, we would like to hear from him," said Double. "We will not be calling him before the FA at this stage, not while we are in Bulgaria with England. We will not have time to analyse it properly."