“JUST GET ON WITH IT COBBER.” Let’s just say, John O’Sullivan is proving to be a touch impatient as he waits over at our live blog for the pool draw for the 2027 rugby World Cup. But if he hangs in there, once the chat is over he’ll find out who Ireland have been drawn with.
Back on the club front, the opening games in the Champions and Challenge Cups take place this weekend, Muireann Duffy bringing you a guide to the nuts and bolts of both competitions.
Johnny Watterson hears from Dan Sheehan ahead of Leinster’s meeting with Harlequins on Saturday, the hooker insisting that he cares not a jot about what he describes as a “sort of hatred” towards the well-resourced club. “If everyone loved us it would be kind of weird,” he says.
And ahead of Munster’s daunting trip away to reigning Premiership champions Bath, Gerry Thornley talks to John Hodnett who has had a rough time of it since summer, fracturing a cheekbone and damaging a ligament in his toe. A change in fortunes is due.
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Connacht, meanwhile, will have to make do without Mack Hansen for Sunday’s Challenge Cup visit to the Ospreys, captain Cian Prendergast also ruled out with an injury. And they’re only two names in a lengthy injury list, Linley Mackenzie bringing you the details.
Gordon D’Arcy is hoping both competitions can “restore rugby’s credibility against a backdrop of maddeningly inconsistent refereeing and wildly different interpretations of the laws from one tournament to the next”. To say he’s frustrated with “this obsession with reshaping rugby into something it isn’t” is an understatement.
Over in Poland, Daniel Wiffen kick-started his European Short-Course Championship campaign with a bronze medal in the 400m freestyle, with his preferred events, the 800m and 1,500m, still to come. Ian O’Riordan fills you in.
In Gaelic games, Seán Moran takes a look at the new deal the Gaelic Players Association struck with the GAA at the weekend, “the biggest ticket of the lot the granting of the GPA claim for NILP (name, image, likeness and personality) or image rights”.
Gordon Manning talks to former Tyrone manager Feargal Logan who “finds himself clasping two bainisteoir bibs” - for Queens and Donaghmore - having wondered if he’d ever be back on the sideline after suffering a stroke early last year.
And in racing, Brian O’Connor has news of a return to action for Joseph O’Brien’s Banbridge who is “on track to settle some unfinished business in Cork’s Bar 1 Hilly Way Chase on Sunday”.
TV Watch: There’s another batch of Premier League games on this evening, all of them live on Sky Sports’ various channels - take your pick from Arsenal v Brentford, Brighton v Aston Villa, Burnley v Crystal Palace and Wolves v Nottingham Forest (all 7.30) and Leeds v Chelsea and Liverpool v Sunderland (both 8.15). And at 8pm this evening, Sky Sports Golf has the opening round of the Australian Open.
