The owner of iconic Blarney Castle has called on the Taoiseach to intervene to secure transatlantic flights from Cork.

Triple Crown hero American Pharoah has been named the 2015 Longines World’s Best Racehorse at a ceremony in London.

American Pharoah faces his date with destiny as he attempts to become the 12th Triple Crown winner, and the first since Affirmed in 1978, in the Belmont Stakes tonight.

From Cork to New York, the Fenian whose funeral is now seen as a dry run for the Easter Rising, will be well remembered this summer on the centenary of his death.

US special operations troops went on a secret mission to Syria this summer to rescue American hostages, including journalist James Foley.

It cannot always be a procession but whatever the golfing gods throw in Rory McIlroy’s way right now he is finding the right path to negotiate those challenges.

UCI president Pat McQuaid has welcomed Lance Armstrong’s confession of using performance-enhancing drugs – and, in particular, the American’s insistence that cycling’s world governing body were not complicit in keeping his doping hidden.

Dustin Johnson began his year in supreme style with victory in the first PGA tournament of 2013 at the Hyundai Tournament of Champions.

Bord Gais Neptune 72 UCC Demons 74

Rory McIlroy showed the exhilarating talents that swept him to the world No. 1 spot with an incredibly timed surge during the final round of the WGC-Cadillac Championship, but he eventually fell two strokes short of the triumphant Justin Rose on a day when Tiger Woods withdrew due to injury - sparking fears over his fitness four weeks out from the Masters.

Andy Murray became only the seventh man in the Open era to reach the semi-finals at all four grand slams in a single year with a gripping 7-5 6-4 3-6 7-6 (7/2) victory over giant American John Isner at the US Open today.

An American man is attempting to live on beer during Lent.

AN AMERICAN who sold his construction business and travelled to Haiti to help earthquake victims was in jail yesterday as authorities investigated allegations he kidnapped an infant.

A group of Americans have come under attack in their vehicle outside a restaurant in Yemen’s capital Sanaa, officials say.

The general sacked by Barack Obama as Afghanistan's coalition commander ended his 34-year army career in a retirement ceremony at his Washington military headquarters.

Paul Casey fired a six-under-par 65 at Harbour Town to give himself a chance of making the cut at the Verizon Heritage as Jim Furyk moved to the top of the early second-round leaderboard.

EDDIE O’SULLIVAN’S USA will face Ireland in the 2011 World Cup in New Zealand.

Mardy Fish hopes to net his biggest prize by capturing the scalp of tournament favourite Andy Murray in the AEGON Championships at Queen’s Club today.

Luke Donald and Paul Casey both went low on the final day of the Verizon Heritage on Sunday night but neither could prevent Brian Gay from breezing to victory at Harbour Town Golf Links.

Brian Gay strengthened his lead at the Verizon Heritage with a bogey-free third round four-under-par 67 at Harbour Town Golf Links in South Carolina.

American Brian Gay charged into the halfway lead at the Verizon Heritage as former Open champion Todd Hamilton made a timely return to form.

Phil Mickelson took an early lead in his tussle with Zach Johnson as the Americans got the second round of the WGC-Accenture Match Play Championship under way at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Club near Tucson today.

ONLY a big fight night in the Big Apple can start with Don King in a Santa Claus outfit and end with a promoter and his boxer both staking claims to fight the same man.

The Gossip singer Beth Ditto hit out at Kate Moss at the NME Awards last night, accusing the supermodel of attending an event she had no business being at.

JIM FURYK, one of the gentlemen of the American game, is happy Paul Azinger has been confirmed as the new US Ryder Cup team captain.

IN THE absence of Tiger Woods, Phil Mickelson and Ernie Els, the game's lesser lights have a chance to make an impact this week at the PGA Tour's season-opening Mercedes Championships in Hawaii.

Malcolm Glazer will assume total control at Manchester United tomorrow – but the American has been warned the widespread anger at his £790m takeover has not gone away.

A Syrian inmate at Iraq’s notorious Abu Ghraib prison told a court martial today that US army Specialist Charles Graner was the primary torturer who laughed while physically abusing him and threatened to kill him more than once.

One American was injured in a mortar attack today on a building housing offices of the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, an embassy spokesman said.

A US embassy spokesman says one American was injured in a mortar attack on building housing embassy offices in Baghdad.

Radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr accepted a peace plan yesterday to end the fighting in Najaf that would disarm his militia and remove them from their hideout in a holy shrine.

A US citizen has turned up at a police station in a town outside Moscow, saying he escaped from captors who abducted him in the capital last month, police said.

President George Bush is set to announce plans to send Americans to Mars and establish a permanent human presence on the moon, senior US administration officials said today.

At least six rockets blasted holes today in a Baghdad hotel seen as a symbol of the US-led occupation.

TOM WATSON extended his love affair with the Ailsa course at Turnberry when he carded a four-under-par 66 to claim a share of the lead alongside compatriot Tom Kite after the first round of the Senior British Open.

The first post-Saddam Hussein governing body of Iraqis will hold its inaugural meeting today, a watershed event on the nation’s path to democracy, said the top US administrator, promising the council will have “real political power”.

Six British soldiers died today in an Iraqi ambush in the ‘Sunni Triangle’ where Saddam Hussein has his greatest support.

Allied soldiers inched towards Baghdad today, capturing or killing paramilitary and Republican Guard defenders while new waves of US bombs set off blazes in the Iraqi capital.

AMR Corp's American Airlines has asked its employees to accept a salary freeze, the company said in a statement.

ALL THE talk in the pubs around Birmingham on Thursday night centered on the extent of the lead the Americans would enjoy by lunchtime yesterday after the opening fourball skirmishes.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s 50-page dossier on Iraq will prove “beyond doubt” that Saddam Hussein’s regime has weapons of mass destruction, Government sources said tonight.

MCDONALDS could be losing its title as burger king.

Tony Blair was returning from holiday tonight to face growing domestic and international unease over the possibility of war with Iraq.

A bioweapons expert under scrutiny for the anthrax attacks today denied he was behind the tainted letters and said “the heinous acts of biological terrorism” appalled him.