Irish player of week

There were plenty of contenders for this week's award, not least Sallynoggin's very own and very promising young Daniel Connor…

There were plenty of contenders for this week's award, not least Sallynoggin's very own and very promising young Daniel Connor, Irish Under-21 goalkeeper, who made a first team comeback for Peterborough on Saturday, replacing the injured Mark Tyler after 15 minutes, following a miserable 12 month spell during which he broke his leg twice.

A good weekend too for another Irish Under-21, Michael Cummins, who made his first appearance of the season for Middlesbrough, while in the second division Sean Devine took his season's tally to 21 goals when he scored a hat-trick for Wycombe against Bury.

In France Tony Cascarino very nearly snatched an improbable win for Nancy away to the mighty Paris St Germain on Saturday when he converted an 85th minute penalty . . . only for the league's secondplaced team to equalise five minutes in to injury time, and 10 seconds from the final whistle.

Our award, though, goes to Tranmere's Irish trio - Joe Murphy, David Kelly and Alan Mahon - all of whom played in yesterday's League Cup final against Leicester at Wembley. Kelly scored, Murphy looked a whole lot more than 18-years-old and Mahon produced a few passes of such quality that explained why he's been linked with a move to a string of Premiership clubs.

Mary Hannigan

Mary Hannigan

Mary Hannigan is a sports writer with The Irish Times