For 12 years they didn’t speak to one another but for the sake of their club Tim Crowe and Davy Fitzgerald yesterday combined forces to guide Sixmilebridge to their fourth Clare SHC title in seven years.

Cathal Malone was in marvellous form as he helped guide Sixmilebridge to their fourth Clare SHC title this decade, their third in five seasons.

Champions St Joseph’s are 60 minutes away from retaining their title after a semi-final victory over Doonbeg at Cusack Park on Saturday.

Cratloe. Indefatigable Cratloe, whether it’s with the big ball or small, they just keep rolling along from week to week and match to match in pursuit of county senior titles.

Cork are through to the final of the Bord Gais Energy Munster under-20 hurling Championship.

If the phoney war taketh away, sometimes the phoney war giveth.

The Clare roar was nowhere to be heard yesterday as the relative silence of Cusack Park in the second half was eventually broken by chants of “Tipp, Tipp, Tipp”.

He’s at the beginning of what he hopes will be a long inter-county career with Clare, but Diarmuid Ryan has come to realise there are more important things in life than hurling.

Business as usual in Kilkenny, Tipp are kidding no-one, but it’s a revision of the best-laid week-one plans for Messrs Meyler, Fanning, and Kenny, says Derek McGrath.

Clare’s Munster and All-Ireland hurling ambitions have been significantly compromised by the loss of a trio of players for what appears to be the entirety of the championship season.

Clare’s Jamie Shanahan has been ruled out of the Munster senior hurling championship after undergoing surgery to alleviate a long-standing back issue.

Shane O’Donnell has rejoined the Clare senior hurling panel following his return from Harvard University last week.

Donal Moloney has seen a lot of hurling in his time, but yesterday in Cusack Park represented something of a first for him.

Aaron Gillane pointed a free in the fifth minute of injury-time to snatch a draw for All-Ireland champions Limerick against the only team to beat them in last year’s championship.

Clare joint-manager Gerry O’Connor is already looking ahead to his side’s clash with Limerick, saying any game between the counties “takes on a life of its own”.

Yesterday in Cusack Park was a pick ‘n’ mix of everything the league can give you. High scores and stirring comebacks, spectacular goals, and lapses in concentration. Something for everyone in the audience.

The scoreline suggests a rip-roaring contest but that is a false reading.

By the time the first rounds of the Derby and the Oaks began in Clonmel yesterday at the National Coursing meeting, which pares the numbers down from 64 to 32 for today’s second day, I was below in Cork.

There’s silverware on offer tomorrow in the Gaelic Grounds, when Clare and Tipperary face off in the final of the Co-Op Superstores Munster senior hurling league (2pm).

Both Jamie Barron, of Waterford, and Shane Golden, of Clare, took positives from Sunday’s Co-Op Superstores Munster SHL game last Sunday.

Clare will face Tipperary in the Co-Op Superstores Munster SHL final, having beaten Waterford in Fraher Field, Dungarvan in front of 3,039 spectators.

It started as a puck-around and ended with managers tangling on the sideline, the kind of pre-season game that picks up momentum before a breathless finish.

Yet another Croke Cup final beckons for St Kieran’s College of Kilkenny after they held on to narrowly defeat a game Ardscoil Rís side in this second semi-final in Clonmel.

They’ll not put a full stop on the season after this latest Harty Cup triumph. Ardscoil Rís are too familiar with this point on the road to be content with their journey so far. The destination has not yet been reached.

Take a left inside the main entrance doors of Midleton CBS and you’ll quickly stumble upon a full board of Harty Cup player profiles.

Munster SHL final

Further experimentation, further opportunity to impress.

Electric Ireland Munster MFC final

The discussion in the staff room at Our Lady’s, Templemore on Wednesday morning centred on the long list of household names who passed through their doors without ever pocketing a Harty Cup medal.

Having ended last season with 50 domestic winners to his credit, Bryan Cooper has started the new campaign in good form and doubled-up on board Horendus Hulabaloo in Tipperary last night.

It was a case of rolling back the years at the rescheduled Kanturk – Duhallow point-to-point meeting at Dromahane on Saturday for Robert Tyner’s 13-year-old Preists Leap sluiced home in the open lightweight.

HIGH School Clonmel, backboned by five members of Tipperary’s All-Ireland minor football winning squad, got their Corn Uí Mhuirí Group C campaign off to a successful start when they defeated Tralee CBS by 2-8 to 0-11 in Newcastle West yesterday afternoon.

THE satisfaction of finishing top of their group and avoiding one of the big guns in the knock-out stages should ensure a rousing contest between Doon CBS and Our Lady’s in the Irish Examiner Dr. Harty Cup at Boherlahan tomorrow.