Harlequins draw first blood in annual showdown

HEAVYWEIGHTS on the bill again in Cork, but a week after the Multi-Nations boxing event, the knockout blow was delivered by an Irish hockey international.

Two dates a season define the game's Munster Senior League, one pre and one post the holiday season at Christmas. Even the chasing pack cocked an ear Saturday to await the scoreline from the meeting of Church of Ireland and Harlequins at Cork's Garryduff complex.

Eight full Irish internationals sprinkled were between Cork's great hockey rivals, with bragging rights, league points and a favourable seeding for the All-Ireland club championship on offer.

That visitors Harlequins came back from a goal down to claim all three points says a lot for the manner in which they have regrouped after losing coach Stephen Jackson and a number of key players in the close-season.

The victory give them a maximum 24 points from eight games, and a six-point gap over C of I, who have one game in hand.

However, coach Stephen Dale needs little reminding that they thumped C of I in the corresponding tie last season (5-0) and were still pipped by their great rivals in the last 90 seconds of the season.

The pity is that neither side is likely to be seriously stretched again until that March league decider.

Hockey continues to struggle for cash and column inches, and the predictability of Munster's duopoly will continue in the absence of a national league.

With clear two-tiered standards in the provincial leagues, Harlequins and C of I players can only prosper in a nation-wide context, but the theory is easy to propagate. The practicalities are slightly different, as basketball a sport with a similar percentage of the public's attention, and the sponsor's readies has found.

The Irish Hockey Association invested heavily in the national side's European ventures in Barcelona last month, but is understandably shy about committing resources to a national league which, for one, would involve extensive travel and cost between the country's furthest points.

Basketball Ireland has reshaped its national league into a regional format, with occasional crossover fixtures. It would appear to be the limit of the IHA's scope, given the necessity to re-arrange the interpros into a single weekend to acknowledge shallow pockets.

Not that the broader vision impacted in any way on Saturday's intense derby at Garryduff.

Denis Pritchard's C of I opened brightly in front of a 200-strong crowd that most AIL rugby clubs would have been satisfied with. Ally Dunne's ninth-minute opener was stunningly simple in its execution, and would have been doubled 10 minutes later but for the sparkling reflexes of Quins' international keeper, Wesley Bateman.

Sean Nicholson's industrious work around midfield helped Quins grab a foothold in the game, and the willingness of 23-year-old attacker David Egner to provide a continual outlet for the visitors under pressure defence would have its reward in due course.

Indeed, his scrappy equaliser on the stroke of half-time was the game's turning point.

The equaliser clearly winded C of I, who were on the back foot on the turnover and found themselves 2-1 down when David Eakins finally made a short corner routine work with 16 minutes remaining.

C of I the upped the tempo but their search for an equaliser had a sense of desperation about it.

Winning the League does more than bring silverware back to Harlequins. First in the permanent tsb Munster Senior League pairs off with third in the Leinster Senior League; second place means a clash with the first ranked club in Ulster.

However, for the time being, bragging rights will do.