They’re not half-pregnant now. For years there, that’s essentially how the Cork senior hurlers were going about the place. 

Irish Examiner writers Michael Moynihan and John Fogarty review the Allianz League weekend.

It’s been three months since Cork lost to Wexford in the senior hurling championship — for the first time in 60 years.

Cork hurling manager Kieran Kingston has secured the services of high-performance expert Gary Keegan for the Rebel hurlers, sources have confirmed.

Olympic hero Paul O’Donovan has thrown another catchphrase into the mix ahead of today’s World Rowing Championship Senior Lightweight Single Sculls final in Rotterdam.

Three experts explain to Joanna Kiernan the differences between dodgy unregulated ‘fat burner’ products, and a healthy supplement plan as part of your fitness regime

Our boxers, used to gruelling training camps in places like Russia, will finally be able to entertain the world’s best in their own backyard, writes Brendan O’Brien

Even now, after he’s gone and the Oireachtas hearing and the forest of newsprint his name and departure triggered, we don’t know what we’ve lost in Billy Walsh.

Niall Turner feared his career would be cut short by injury not once but three times in the last four years.

Wexford’s Katie Fitzhenry is confident that Ireland can progress from their group at this weekend’s global women’s rugby sevens tournament in UCD.

You come across them from time to time, inter-county Gaelic footballers who aren’t actually that interested in Gaelic football generally, Philly McMahon being a case in point.

Ireland eventing high performance manager Nick Turner says securing qualification for the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro has meant for a “switch in focus”.

THE COUNTRY’s leading sports nutrition expert claims the GAA hasn’t grasped the potential impact of strict new anti-doping measures brought in last month.

Equestrian: US-based riders get the chance to show off their horsepower to Ireland manager Robert Splaine in today’s $200,000 Furusiyya Nations Cup opener in Ocala, Florida, though Kevin Babington got in early last night when winning the 1.50m grand prix qualifier on Mark Q.

IT’S 20 years since this column sat down to complete the Leaving Cert – for a second, excruciating time – but it is probably some sort of twisted pseudo-tribute to that daunting time in all our lives that scraps of the information we had to learn by rote occasionally jostle their way back to the forefront of the mind when least expected, writes Brendan O’Brien.

A former boxing coach out in the Institute of Sport may be among the most invisible players in Irish sport, but he’s one of its most influential too, writes Kieran Shannon.

This morning, the chairman of the national hurling review forum will be out coaching Portroe’s Under 16 Camogie team, encouraging each and every player — his daughter included. "In this country, we knock too much," says Tipperary’s All-Ireland-winning coach Liam Sheedy.

The indoor athletics season has begun and it will culminate in the IAAF World Indoor Championships in Sopot, Poland in early March.

Chloe Magee flashes a wide smile. She is talking about her future targets and ambitions. And her goals are big.

Dr Rod McLoughlin was yesterday named IRFU’s Head of Medical Services with responsibility for managing a system which provides world-class care to professional players.

The Irish Sports Council (ISC) yesterday revealed its Olympic Games debrief and while there was some praise, there were plenty of negatives too.

Once again the Irish contingent will leave an Olympics where the boxing team has been amazing.

It is a strange individual that enjoys the torture of marathon running.

Ciarán Ó Lionáird will face a defining moment in his career when he lines up for the first round heats of the men’s 1500m at the Olympic Stadium tonight (8.25pm).

Gary Keegan created the blueprint for the emergence of Ireland as a world force in amateur boxing, so it is no surprise that when his time with IABA came to an end, he would be earmarked to apply his expertise and energy to the country’s entire sporting environment.

Looking back now, the man in the optician’s shop probably didn’t mean anything by what he said, but it was still an own goal of massive proportions.

Lisa Kearney is set to be confirmed as Ireland's first ever Olympic women's judo competitor, despite being beaten in the European Championships in Russia today.

Paralympics Ireland are confident they can exceed their medal targets at the forthcoming Olympics.

Gaelic, rugby, soccer and hockey chiefs have signed up to plans to develop the new National Sports Campus.

It may be the Olympics but don’t expect the world.

THE government is asking the country’s three biggest sporting bodies to cough up the bulk of the finance needed to construct the first phase of the National Sports Campus on Dublin’s northside.

GARY Keegan was looking for a way to explain to his boxers that improvement would be gradual, not sudden. He hit on a simple visual aid.

THE Irish Hockey Association yesterday gave the green light to controversial plans to centralise the women’s senior hockey team in Dublin for 10 months.

THE GAA appears to be standing up to the recession’s buffeting thus far, judging by attendance figures released yesterday and Christy Cooney’s positive utterances about projected income figures for the year.

THE leading Olympic official in the country has launched a stinging attack on the Irish Sports Council’s High Performance Unit which, he claims, has failed in its brief to produce results at the Games despite record levels of funding.

THE Genesis Olympic Review, commissioned by the Olympic Council of Ireland, yesterday painted a bleak picture of the relationship between some of nation’s top sporting organisations and warned that a change of attitude must be enforced if success at the London 2012 Games is to be achieved.

Former GAA president Sean Kelly will today make his official bid to run for Fine Gael in next year’s European elections.

Team Ireland received a rapturous reception after returning home from the 2008 Olympics via Dublin Airport today.

The GAA should jointly honour Michael Collins and Eamon de Valera to help banish the "bitterness and poison" of the Civil War, former GAA president Sean Kelly said.

Former GAA president Sean Kelly is to deliver the oration at the annual Michael Collins commemoration at Beal na mBlath later this month.

Sean Kelly has announced that he is stepping down from his role as executive chairman of the Irish Institute of Sport.