With the winter break just a couple of weeks away, new research from chartered physiotherapist Huw Rees says this is a key phase for Irish hockey clubs to manage after a spate of injuries last spring.

Ayeisha McFerran has been passed fit to play some part in the women’s EuroHockey Championships which get underway next weekend in Antwerp.

Cliodhna Sargent’s penalty corner strike powered Cork Harlequins into the Irish Senior Cup semi-finals as they snatched a late 2-1 win over Muckross.

Caoimhe Perdue’s strike gave Cork Harlequins a big lift as they defeated Muckross at Farmers’ Cross to get them back in contention for a top-four EY Hockey League play-off place.

UCC missed out on possible promotion to the women’s EY Hockey League in frustrating fashion at the Mardyke as they ended the round-robin in third place.

Ireland’s women have been dealt a reasonably favourable pool in the women’s World Cup next July with their date with India looking to be the crucial one if they are to make the knock-out phases.

UCD claimed the women’s EY Hockey League in dramatic fashion as Lena Tice struck two penalty corners to inflict a first defeat of the league season on Hermes-Monkstown, leap-frogging their Dublin rivals on the final day of the campaign.

Emma Buckley looks set to continue a trend of young Ireland senior debutants as the Mount Mercy College student is poised to win her first cap next week.

Banbridge Academy completed a fairytale season by claiming the Subway All-Ireland Schoolgirls Championship in style at Havelock Park yesterday.

Ursulines Thurles’ hopes of a first Subway All-Ireland Schoolgirls title since 1996 are all but dead as Kilkenny College and Banbridge Academy led the way on the first day of the national championships at Havelock Park yesterday.

The ever-growing gap between the EY Hockey League and the provincial leagues was evident as big scorelines littered the women’s Irish Senior Cup first round on Saturday.

Susan O’Shea sets up base camp at Muckross Park Hotel and comes away as liberated as a former guest, The Liberator.

Munster sides landed three national titles from a possible four over a memorable weekend at Belfield.

A project to honour a man whose family presented Muckross House and 11,000 acres, which are now make up a large part of Killarney National Park, to the nation has been launched in Killarney.

Leinster showed remarkable energy and resilience to retain the U18 boys interpro title, playing all four of their games in just 30 hours.

The escalating cost of agricultural land is making it difficult to acquire land for burial ground in an area already short of publicly- owned grave plots.

Rower Paul O’Donovan admitted the disappointment of finishing fourth at the world juniors two years ago was the driving factor in his medal winning performance at the U23 equivalent on Sunday.

Historic rowing rivals Oxford and Cambridge have taken part in the world’s oldest traditional regatta in Killarney.

The five-star Muckross Park Hotel has been put back in receivership after businessman Bill Cullen and partner Jackie Lavin lost their legal battle for court protection while they put an investor in place.

The descendants of the great houses of the South-West, whose social life once revolved around each other, gathered for the first time in more than 100 years at Muckross House in Killarney over the weekend.

A long-serving bishop has sparked a storm of controversy over his fitness for the job after revealing he used to think paedophilia was friendship gone too far.

BACK in the day before cigarettes cost an arm and a leg and students lived frugally, I was known to bum the odd Marlboro. I returned the favour whenever I got paid for working an occasional shift in the college library. Re-arranging the music section according to the Dewey decimal system kept us all in fags for at least one night on the razz.

THE five-star Muckross Park Hotel and spa in Killarney, owned by Apprentice stars Bill Cullen and Jackie Lavin, has undergone a change in management, with Choice Hotels, developers of the Clarion brand appointed as business consultants.

UCD won the blue riband senior eight race at the Irish Rowing Championships at Inniscarra on Saturday and denied NUIG/Gráinne Mhaol a third consecutive title.

TV ENTREPRENEUR Bill Cullen and partner Jackie Lavin are having their own rough apprenticeship in the Irish property game.

IT was business as usual for jarveys in Killarney National Park yesterday, despite a warning they would be barred from the tourist attraction if they did not fit dung-catching devices to their traps.

IRELAND has secured a second boat at the Olympics as the Irish men’s lightweight four (LM4-) put in an impressive performance in the final qualifying regatta in Poznan, Poland yesterday to confirm their place in Beijing.

DAVID HOBBS will celebrate his 100th Irish cap this weekend, and become the youngest player in Irish Hockey history to do so.

The Irish men's lightweight four (LM4) of Gearoid Towey (Fermoy), Eugene Coakley (Skibbereen), Richard Archibald (Lady Victoria BC), and Paul Griffin (Muckross) take on the elite of International rowing in this afternoon's world championship final at 2.15pm.

THREE lots jointly topped the sale at Curraheen Park on Saturday, when they were each sold for €3,000.

The Irish men’s lightweight four of Gearoid Towey, Eugene Coakley, Richard Archibald and Paul Griffin won their heat at the second leg of Rowing World Cup in Poznan, Poland this morning, to qualify directly for Saturday’s final.

A €20,000 bursary is being made available by Muckross House in Killarney to students taking a degree course in Irish cultural studies at the Institute of Technology (IT), Tralee.

The Muckross club from Killarney travelled to the Bantry sprint regatta yesterday and came away with six race wins, ahead of the best West Cork outfit, Skibbereen, who won five.

IT’S another world as far as children of today are concerned — a place apart with smoke curling from the chimneys of thatched houses, horses ploughing and homely women in aprons baking bread.