Some little things . . .

CAROLINE DOWNEY Desmond, wife of multi-millionaire financier Dermot Desmond, is to receive the Chello Foundation Humanitarian Award at a fundraising ball in Dublin’s Mansion House later this month.

She follows in the footsteps of Denis O’Brien, Bob Geldof, Peter Sutherland and its founder Shane O’Neill, a successful Irish businessman who died in February from the degenerative brain illness Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease aged just 50.

The Chello Foundation is an Irish charity that supports Aids orphans in sub-Saharan Africa. It has raised about €250,000 to date and helped to fund the full-time education of 5,000 sub-Saharan orphans.

Downey Desmond is being recognised for her “prolific” fundraising, which has raised €38 million to date for Irish and overseas charities. O’Neill would no doubt approve.

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THERE WAS no evidence of recession at Shelbourne Park in Dublin last Saturday night as the Ladbrokes Irish Greyhound Derby was run in front of a capacity crowd of more than 6,000.

This represented a one-third increase on 2011.

Perhaps the extra crowd was due to the band Aslan performing the role of warm-up act.

On-track Tote betting was up 18.4 per cent at €190,000 while bookmaker turnover was “on a par” with last year.

In total, about €773,000 was wagered at the stadium over a three-hour period with an additional €50,000 in bets coming in from other venues via the Tote.

Irish Greyhound Board chief executive Adrian Neilan said that Ladbrokes has decided to step aside as Derby sponsor for next year, although the bookie will be associated with other events.

“In the meantime, we have opened negotiations with a number of different parties. It’s a very significant event in the Irish sporting calendar which ticks a lot of boxes for the corporate sector,” Neilan said.