Limerick IT in must win game

LIMERICK IT must beat arch-rivals UL today to stay in the Fitzgibbon Cup race, having already lost their opening game in the round robin series.

The sides met in the league final before Christmas and LIT emerged winners after a titanic struggle, but in the early rounds UL gave LIT a bit of a trimming. It all makes today’s championship clash that bit more intriguing.

Both sides are rich in inter-county talent. Galway’s Niall Healy, Clare’s Jonathan Clancy, Joe Canning (Galway) and Bernard Gaffney (Clare) and Maurice O’Brien (Limerick) will ensure champions LIT won’t go out without a fight.

UL were also beaten by WIT in their opener but by a bigger margin which suggests they don’t have the necessary firepower to trouble LIT. However, in a winner-take-all situation, expect the university students to have a right cut off this one. They will be backed by inter-county players Brian Dowling, Kieran Joyce (Kilkenny), Seamus Hickey (Limerick), Brian Carroll (Offaly) and Pa Cronin (Cork) and there is sufficient talent in their side to cause an upset.

Cork IT, hosts to this year’s event, travel to Dublin to take on DIT and will fancy their chances of making it to the knock-out stages.

The CIT team is backboned by a host of county U21 stars in Eoin Dillon, Stephen White, Ross Cashman, Leigh Desmond and senior Cathal Naughton.

UCC need just a point to be certain of a home quarter-final tie but won’t get anything soft from GMIT in Galway tomorrow.

The Cork students had little difficulty in seeing off Garda College in round one and when you consider they rested Kilkenny seniors Donncha Cody and Michael Rice and still had eight points to spare, it gives you an idea of their strength.

GMIT need at least a draw to make the knockout stages but will have to show vast improvement up front. They could only manage three points from play out of 11 against Garda and that certainly would not be good enough against the Cork students.

Limerick senior Andrew O’Shaughnessy, Ger Mahon (Galway), Conor Kavanagh and Paul Callinan will spearhead the GMIT challenge. However, even with home advantage, they don’t have sufficient fire power .

The fourth game today is an all-Dublin affair between UCD and St Pat’s in Drumcondra. It promises to be a keenly-contested affair with both teams playing several established inter-county players.

UCD had little difficulty in seeing off UUJ in round one in a game where Kilkenny’s Maurice Nolan ended up with 1-10 but Offaly’s Brendan Murphy is struggling with an injury which could rule him out.

Wexford senior PJ Nolan is expected to play despite injury, along with Paul Ormonde, Stephen Nolan (Wexford) and Cian McBride (Dublin).

St. Pats are rich in talent. Kilkenny’s “Cha” Fitzpatrick, former minor star Richie Hogan (Kilkenny) and Clare’s Ger Arthur should ensure they won’t be easily beaten. All games 2pm throw-in.