World Rugby throws the book at Erasmus; Unlikely football friends in Cork

Unsurprisingly, Rassie Erasmus is in a lot of trouble. World Rugby have banned the Springboks' director of rugby from all rugby activity for two months, while also banning him from any matchday involvement in any capacity until September 2022. The book has been well and truly thrown, and when you see the powerful evidence offered by Australian referee Nic Berry - one of the targets of Erasmus' criticism in his infamous 62 minute long video - it is hardly surprising. Reports from the disciplinary hearing show that Berry suffered a "significant amount of distress" after Erasmus had "engaged in a character assassination of me on social media" which has caused his reputation "irreparable damage". Erasmus has made it clear that he will appeal his sanction, so the drama is not over yet. In his column this morning, Ciarán Murphy takes on those who he sees as too quick to discount Ireland's All Blacks victory since it came outside of a knock-out tournament: "almost a million people showed some element of interest in the final score, without taking into account the entire population of New Zealand, who follow every move of their national team with the sort of rapt attention more usually given to K-pop starlets. Regardless of anything else, isn't that enough?"

Sport always tends to throw up unlikely storylines, and Mary Hannigan has found another one down in Cork. Shelbourne and Ireland's Saoirse Noonan grew up on the same estate in Grange as Chiedozie Ogbene, Rotheram and Ireland's star man. What's more though, four days after Ogbene made his international debut, Noonan received her first call up. She debuted just 12 days after Ogbene notched his first Ireland goal. A day after Noonan and Shels won the league, Ogbene scored in Ireland's feel-good Luxembourg win. The pair of childhood friends, who still keep in touch, are worn out from sending congratulatory texts to each other. Speaking of that Luxembourg win, despite songs of praise lavished on Stephen Kenny by the Irish who travelled to the Stade de Luxembourg, Packie Bonner and FAI President Gerry McAnaney have both refused to endorse Kenny as Republic of Ireland manager ahead of this month's board meeting. Bonner though, who chairs the association's international and high performance committee, did inadvertently compare Kenny's squad to that of Jack Charlton's while admitting he has seen progress of late in the group.

Kilmallock's talismanic forward Graeme Mulcahy has been speaking ahead of the Munster hurling championship. The Limerick champions, having won that crown back in October, await this weekend's Cork final between Glen Rovers and Midleton. Once that clash is decided, Kilmallock will take on the victor on the weekend of December 11th/12th, a full seven weeks after they secured their own county title, compared to a three week gap following the Cork final. It's a strange difference between the two, and it remains to be soon if it suits one side over the other. Up in Derry, it's safe to say that Conor Glass has had a successful return home after a stint in the AFL with Hawthorn. Glass broke down in tears after recently helping Glen secure their maiden senior county title, and he has been speaking about the peace of mind that he now has after encountering such success so soon after returning from Oz.

Ireland's cricket squad is in Zimabawe currently ahead of the World Cup qualifiers. Shauna Kavanagh, one of the senior players in a very young squad, missed the last qualifying tournament after testing positive for Covid. She discusses how the virus hit her quite hard initially and how it took a number of weeks to be able to return to simple activities such as running. Joanne O'Riordan's column looks at the story of John Fulham, the Paralympian who is racing his son, Harry, in the Liberty Race, a virtual race for people with and without a disability. Fulham is doing this race in his everyday wheelchair, possibly the equivalent of running a marathon in flip-flops or your slippers.