Guinness references flow as Leona Maguire wins US commentators’ hearts

It was a very sweet gesture on the part of Grant Boone to attempt to congratulate our Ballyconnell, Co Cavan wonder as Gaeilge when all you could imagine was his bewilderment when he did a bit of Googling and found “comhghairdeas”.

The Nashville man would, then, have been forgiven for opting for, say, “com-huh-gu-hair-dees”’, and we’d have thought none the less of him, but instead his effort was a mighty fine “co-har-jus ,Leona!”

In fact, it was enough to – maybe – encourage Irish viewers to forgive him for putting the wind up them for the bulk of Leona Maguire’s closing round in Florida which Sky Sports Mix, bless them, shared with us.

In fact, at one point Sky split the screen on their golf channel to show us Leona and Séamus Power on top of their respective leaderboards, and all you could do, really, was light a cigar as a salute to us lot being the golfing master race.

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But American Grant and his American crew at Peacock, whose American coverage Sky was bringing us, reminded us far too frequently that American Lexi Thompson was breathing down Leona's neck. This, in rugby terms, would be akin to being told Tadhg Furlong was about to tackle you. Wits? Scared out of you.

(We’re digressing here briefly to honour Bernard Jackman’s pre-match observation on RTÉ on Saturday that Furlong “carries the ball like a farmer carries a bag of meal”. All we can say is, co-har-jus, Bernard.)

Fleetwood Mac tribute band

Grant’s Peacock colleagues Paige Mackenzie, Jerry Foltz, Amy Rogers and Tripp Isenhour (which sounds a little like the line-up of a Fleetwood Mac tribute band) were all emotionally invested in Lexi lassoing Leona, and when she reduced Éireann’s lead – not to be parochial about it – to two with six to play, there was some hyperventilating on their part.

But lookit, did we complain when George Hamilton didn’t sound gutted for Daniel Timofte when Packie Bonner saved his penalty? No.

The thing was, though, that there was a bit of the Catherine Tates about Leona’s level of concern about Lexi’s pursuit: “Am I bovvered?”

She wasn’t. She strolled home, winning by three in the end, making golf look as easy as peasy and helping herself to a whole chunk of history.

“The Guinness will be flowing in Dublin tonight,” said Grant, like we didn’t see that coming. Although he quickly added – perhaps having Googled “how angry can the Breffni folk get?” – “and around Co Cavan.”

“This wasn’t a surprise, it was just a matter of when,” said Paige, which was true, but when Amy caught up with a champagne-doused Leona, she could only think of the journey to this point. “It’s a bit surreal,” she said, “it’s been 17 years in the making.” You’d have a notion that won’t be the last night we’ll be tuning in to a closing LPGA round on Sky Sports Mix with the, eh, Guinness on ice.

Rebel flag

Cavan? The mother of all sporting Saturdays. Castlemartyr? Not bad either, Donal Lenihan planting his Rebel flag on Mack Hansen’s head lest any other county, including Co Canberra, try to lay claim to him.

The man of the match in the end, which was a decent enough start to his Irish career, although those curly-curly, Roberto Carlos-esque wind-defying kicks by Johnny Sexton should probably have earned him at least a share of the gong.

And then, just in case the weekend wasn’t tremendous enough, Scotland beat England in rather dramatic circumstances, all described by the BBC’s Andrew Cotter, who could make commentating on the opening of a tin of dog food a wonderful thing.

And come Sunday, Killenaule's Rachael Blackmore and Honeysuckle were at it again. "A little star, and a little star under her too," as Ted Walsh described the pair's third Irish Champion Hurdle win. "We're perished, but we're lucky to be here," said Jane Mangan.

By now you can half imagine Christy Moore using his Joxer tune for a new offering, along the lines of: “Castlemartyr, Ballyconnell and the lovely Killenaule, sporting heroes they have given us, we co-har-jus you one and all . . .”