Pitch & Putt Ireland2014 National Juvenile Inter-County Preview
A look ahead to the battle for the Tommy Murphy Cup on Sunday
Seven counties will contest the battle for this year’s Tommy Murphy Cup at the National Juvenile Inter-County in Navan on Sunday. Communications & Press Officer Jason O’Connor assess the state of play in advance of Sunday’s proceedings.
IN contrast to their male counterparts, the Juvenile Inter-County has produced a most healthy variety of winners over the last three years. Dublin were victory in Deerpark back in 2011, Kerry won out in St Bridgets in 2012 with Cork just piping the Kingdom in the defence of their title by a shot last year in Raffen Creek (then Pfizer). This year seven teams take part in the event with the host county Meath and Louth joining last year’s participants Cork, Dublin, Kerry, Offaly and Tipperary.
Dublin and Cork were the recent winners of the Provincial Inter-Counties in McBride and Tipperary Hills. Meath and Kerry were the respective runners-up in both provinces and certainly in the case of the hosts they will be hoping that Navan will play into their hands on Sunday. The Royal County will have four representatives from the host club on their team namely, Ryan Crocock, Jason Gibney, Liam Carroll and Conor Doyle with Bellewstown’s Luke Heeney and Castletown’s Evan Carry making up the six player team. Dublin are represented by the same six who brought them success in McBride namely Ross O’Reilly, Jamie Power, the two Aaron’s Donnelly and Monaghan along with the two Ciaran’s, Gregan and Lynch. Cork make one change from the team which was successful in St Annes with Edward Walsh taking Ryan Towler’s place alongside Cian Morrison, Anthony McSweeney, Charlie Morrissey, David Howard and Conor Irwin.
Kerry have the same six who lined out two weeks ago namely Michael Cronin, Stephen McCarthy, Sean Courtney, Stephen McCarthy, Mark Harnett, Conor Quirke as well as Eamon Sheehy. Offaly have the distinction of being the only team with a girl amongst their ranks as Amy Galvin lines out alongside Mark Newman, Jack Dench, Josh Fleming, Daniel Fox and Ciaran Doyle. Their playing partners on Sunday, Tipperary are made up of Ryan O’Sullivan, Sean O’Neill, Conor O’Halloran, Gavin Dooley, Sean Crowe and Tim Clarke with both counties no doubt hoping to put in a good showing on Sunday. Louth meanwhile will tee-off with Kerry and Dublin in the opening pairings and they are made up of the following players namely Jamie Leech, Chris Behan, Niall McGinnity, Ciaran O’Reilly, Conor Brennan and Caoimhin O’Brien.
It will be a quick format of Foursomes followed by 18 holes Singles on Sunday leaving the margin of error very tight for all players concerned. All bar one of the counties partaking on Sunday (Offaly) have won this event at some stage since its inception back in 1979. Cork lead the roll of honour with 15, Dublin have won the Tommy Murphy Cup eight times, Kerry have won it four times, Meath three, Tipperary twice with Louth’s solitary success coming back in 1985. 35 years on from Dublin were crowned the first winners of the event back in 1979 it will be interesting to see how it all plays out in Navan on Sunday.
We wish everyone connected to the event in Navan the very best of luck this weekend. Remember that you can follow proceedings via the PPUI website and there will also be updates on our Facebook and Twitter pages.
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