Star-studded line-up for battle royal at Lahinch

FOUR of Ireland’s finest have qualified for this morning’s semi-finals of the Shell South of Ireland at Lahinch.

Defending champion Colm Moriarty (Athlone), 24, meets the 2001 champion Justin Kehoe (Birr), 23, in the first match and they are followed by Mallow’s Mervyn Owens, 22, who has made a very welcome return to form after a few years in the wilderness, and 25 year-old Michael McGeady from City of Derry.

It is to be ardently hoped that the weather for today’s closing stages is a lot more amenable than it was yesterday when the rain and wind in the first half of the day was so severe that the championship committee postponed the quarter-finals for an hour in the hope that the elements might relent a little. But it was still hard going by any standards, something to which David Finn, one of two Mallow players to reach the last eight, will readily testify.