Hockey: Leinster have threatened to pull out of this year's men's Senior Interprovincial Championships unless the proposed format for the competition is changed, writes Johnny Watterson.

The Irish Hockey Association (IHA) have changed the format of the competition, which is to take place at Grange Road on November 26th-28th, to include teams playing two matches in one day. This comes about due to the withdrawal of the Shamrocks (Irish under-21s) for financial reasons. Connacht do not compete.

The Leinster Branch and the Munster Branch informed the IHA at a council meeting last Saturday they were not prepared to ask teams to take part in two high level matches in one day as it did not go down well with players.

The format has been tried before but the player feedback was negative. The perception was that fatigue led to a higher incidence of injuries.

Despite the concerns of both branches, the IHA out-voted them and the format has remained as proposed.

Leinster have now stated that they will not take part in the competition unless it reflects what the players want.

SWIMMING: Swimming waved goodbye to its greatest champion late on Monday as Jenny Thompson swam into retirement on a record breaking final night at the short course world championships in Indianapolis.

The most decorated swimmer in history with 83 international medals, including eight Olympic golds ,Thompson (33), wrote the final line in her career by taking bronze in the 100 metre butterfly.

She won two golds, a silver and a bronze in her final competitive swim before heading back to medical school.

Australia's Brooke Hanson won the 200 metres breaststroke to become the first competitor to capture six gold medals at a single short course world championships.

She won five individual events and helped Australia to victory in the 4x100 metres medley relay.

Hanson joins Mark Spitz, Kristin Otto, Ian Thorpe and Michael Phelps as the only swimmers to win as many as six golds at an Olympic or world championships.

Britain's James Hickman won the 200 metres butterfly, becoming the first swimmer to win gold in the same event at five different world championships.

Aaron Peirsol lowered his world record in the 200 metres breaststroke to one minute, 50.52 seconds then helped the US 4x100 metres medley relay team to another world record of 3:25.09. ...