The biggest Universities soccer tournament in Ireland, the Collingwood Cup, yesterday agreed a welcome four-year sponsorship deal, worth £60,000, with Budweiser. The competition, which will be hosted this year by the University of Ulster at Jordanstown, from February 16th-20th, is the oldest All-Ireland tournament in existence. It is the first time that the competition will be hosted by UUJ on their own.

The host university are seeking a hat-trick of wins, but the tournament should be hotly contested, with UCG, UCC and UCD among the other seeded sides. The original Collingwood Cup was presented in 1914 by Bertram J Collingwood, professor of Physiology at UCD. Prof Bertram was also a nephew of Lewis Carroll, author of Alice in Wonderland, a fact that the students, no doubt, will appreciate.