Joe Schmidt will be hoping Steve Hansen doesn’t bear a grudge when the All Blacks head coach helps pull Ireland’s 2019 World Cup pool opponents out of the bag during today’s draw in Kyoto, Japan.

Alex Wright sharpened up his preparations for the European Race Walking Cup by winning the 10k race walk as sprinters stole the show at the Leevale Sports in CIT on Saturday.

Some 1,500 people made the journey from Ireland to Lord’s for yesterday’s one-day international against England, and most of them would have come with alternative plans in case of an early finish.

Irish Rowing — and those involved in the sport in Skibbereen — were yesterday celebrating an impressive medal haul from the World Cup Regatta in Belgrade.

The marathon, which Sinead Kane is running in aid of Cliona’s Foundation, will be her eighth of 2017 and that’s not including the 172km she covered during a 24 hour race on an indoor track in Finland, writes Eoghan Cormican.

Twenty-three years ago, Limerick jockey Declan Murphy’s skull was so badly fractured in a fall at Haydock Park that his death was confirmed by the Racing Post. Prematurely as it happened, writes Colm Greaves.

Irish-trained runners were utterly dominant at the Cheltenham Festival, recording a record haul, but the British-based trainers are fighting back on the return trip, to Punchestown, writes Tommy Lyons.

Ireland could make their Test cricket debut as early as next year, after the International Cricket Council approved a new constitution that outlines a Test pathway for associate teams.

The first World Cup event of the season looms large for Ireland’s senior rowers. World Cup One takes place in Belgrade, Serbia from May 5-7.

Benetton Treviso v Munster, Guinness PRO12: It is perhaps the most encouraging aspect of Munster’s European Champions Cup semi-final defeat by Saracens last week; that not a single member of the team or coaching setup has deluded themselves about the merit of the English team’s victory.

On the day Ireland captain Seamus Coleman was in Liverpool breaking his silence about his injury nightmare, former skipper Robbie Keane was in Dublin offering words of advice to the Donegal man as he begins the long road to recovery at Everton.

Here's your lunchtime news bulletin.

Here's your morning news bulletin.

Love was clearly in the air at Ashford Castle in Mayo last weekend as Rory McIlroy wed his American fiancée Erica Stoll.