Ailing attendances, the strong getting stronger and the weak getting weaker, the Ulster championship finds itself at a crossroads.

It must have felt like Brexit had come early for Down — and boy was it a hard one.

Paddy Deegan has watched enough football in his life, going back to his sons’ first steps on the Downpatrick pitch, to seeing them win

New Down manager Paddy Tally says working with the Galway footballers this year gave him a new appreciation of the game and gave him the ambition to become an inter-county manager.

Mattie Donnelly knew what some were saying. And he knew why.

Galway football coach Paddy Tally to set to be named Down manager next week.

Galway manager Kevin Walsh will pass on the opportunity to rest his marquee players for Saturday’s visit of Monaghan, according to former Farney forward Tommy Freeman.

Galway football captain Damien Comer has credited Paddy Tally with bringing greater directness to the county’s attacking play.

Sigerson Cup Final 

St Mary’s College 1-10 NUI Galway 1-7

The battle to become Galway senior hurling manager next season has been cut to a two-horse race between current manager Anthony Cunningham and his former selector and coach Mattie Kenny.

Ambrose Rogers, Conor Laverty and Championship debutant Niall Madine has been named in the Down team for Sunday's Ulster SFC quarter-final against Derry at Celtic Park (throw-in 2pm).

Milldean Tally produced another brilliant performance when winning the 2012 Sporting Press Irish Oaks at Shelbourne Park on Saturday night.

The introduction of the new Mini Open grade from next Tuesday has been widely welcomed by owners and trainers and should fill the huge void which had existed in the current grading system.

There were disgraceful scenes at the end of a Sigerson Cup match in Galway yesterday after a referee was accosted before a mob of angry players raced to his dressing room and tried to confront him.

AS anticipated, Down’s James McCartan’s management team has changed, with former Kildare selector Aidan O’Rourke coming in and Brian McIver and Paddy Tally leaving. Jerome Johnston remains as an assistant.

BACK in February, only days after his team had carved out a hard-earned win up in Armagh in the opening round of the league, Bernard Brogan was wheeled out at one of those sponsored media gigs to give his assessment about Dublin’s prospects for the season.

BENNY COULTER has battled in vain to claim an Ulster senior football medal for a decade so it comes as something of a surprise with the revelation that he is happy to have lost to Tyrone this summer.

DOWN’S Benny Coulter has attributed his spectacular return to form to a man who played a pivotal role when Saturday’s opponents Tyrone made the breakthrough to win a first All-Ireland title.

Two-time All-Star winner James McCartan was tonight named as the new Down senior football manager after a County Committee meeting.

SIOBHÁN DOWD, winner of this year’s Bisto Children’s Book of the Year for her third children’s book, Bog Child, battled against time to get her latest prize- winning novel finished.

Ulster football kingpins Armagh and Tyrone have both appointed new Under-21 managers for the 2006 season.

All-Ireland champions Tyrone’s first competitive fixture of 2006 will see them face Down in the opening round of the Dr McKenna Cup.

Tyrone football trainer Paddy Nally has stepped down from his role. Tally confirmed the surprise news but would not comment any further.

AS desperate punters scramble to find that bet that will make their fortune at the Galway races, one super lucky punter is already home and dry after passing the winning post in style.

A last minute twist saw independent candidate Marion Harkin topping the North West poll tonight, with Sinn Fein Pearse Doherty a close second.

Newly-installed Tyrone manager Mickey Harte has named Paddy Tally as his assistant.

"It was a daunting prospect, but I think it sort of worked out," veteran British actor Anthony Hopkins says about revisiting Hollywood’s favourite psychopath, Hannibal Lecter, for a third time.

The prequel to The Silence of the Lambs could begin production as early as September.