Old rivals set for another titanic struggle

RIVAL coaches Brian Walsh of Cork Constitution and Geoff Moylan of Shannon are waiting until this morning to finalise their sides for today’s AIB League Division One final at Lansdowne Road.

They had no option. Injuries and the requirements of the Munster team for last night’s Celtic League game against Connacht at Thomond Park meant that their hands were tied in several areas. To their credit, neither Walsh nor Moylan was complaining, both accepting that “Alan Gaffney has a job to do with Munster and it’s the way it’s been all season and we just have to get on with it”.

And Walsh made a telling point: “The fact that the two sides provided so many players to Munster and Ireland throughout the season and are still through to the league final is testament to the strength in depth in both clubs.”

Victory this afternoon would certainly round off a fantastic week for the Constitution captain Jerry Murray, whose wife, Nicola, gave birth to a baby girl on Thursday. He will lead a Con pack which is without the highly influential Ultan O’Callaghan because of the concussion he picked up in last week’s semi-final win over Buccaneers, and quite probably second-row David Pusey, who was yesterday called up for Munster action in place of Paul O’Connell.

Pusey may be on the bench with Colin O’Keeffe stepping up to partner Shane O’Connor.

Pat McCarthy, another concussion victim from last week, is replaced by moving Tomas O’Leary from the wing to scrum-half, where he plays for the Ireland U21s. Cian Mahony is ruled out in the centre because he will be attending his sister’s wedding and that, in all likelihood, means a start at out-half for Kiwi Steve McColl with Conrad O’Sullivan wearing the No 12 shirt and Derek Dillon, Cronan Healy and Dave O’Brien comprising the back three.

Much, however, is dependent on what happened at Thomond Park last night and the same applies to Shannon. They are hopeful that the ankle injury Mossy Lawler picked up in last week’s win over Belfast Harlequins will have cleared up sufficiently to allow him take his place on the left wing. If so, they will field an unchanged back division. Jerry Flannery may start on the bench, with Nigel Conroy starting at hooker, and there is also a question mark over Frankie Roche’s availability.

However, they don’t appear to be short of options in the back five with every prospect of Eddie Halvey finding a place on the flank.

Shannon came out on top when the clubs met in the final at headquarters two years ago.

But Con won the most recent meeting between the sides after recovering from a distinctly shaky start. That will obviously provide a deal of confidence going into the final but Brian Walsh, David Corkery and the other Constitution backroom boys are only too aware of the threat posed by Shannon, five- times champions and for whom out-half Andrew Thompson will set an AIL record should he pick up a sixth medal this afternoon.

Today’s programme gets underway at noon with the Division Three decider between Greystones and Ards, followed by the Division Two decider between UL Bohs and Trinity at 2pm.

CORK CONSTITUTION (probable): D. O’Brien; C. Healy, J. V. Igarza, C. O’Sullivan, D. Dillon; S. McColl, T. O’Leary; G. Murray, D. Murray, M. Ross, C. O’Keeffe, S. O’Connor, J. Sheahan, B. O’Connor, J. Murray (capt).

SHANNON: J. Lacey; T. Cregan, B. Tuohy, E. Cahill, M. Lawler; A. Thompson, F. O’Loughlin; Front row (from) F. Roche, N. Conroy, G. McNamara; Back five (from): T. Hayes capt, J. Hadnett, T. Hogan, E. Halvey, J. O'Connor, C. McMahon.

UL/BOHEMIAN (v Dublin University): C. Garvey; K. Matthews, C. Finn, M. McPhail, Barry Murphy; P. Treacy, L. O’Connell; M. Harty, G. Ryan, J. Danaher, R. Hartigan, A. Hartigan, A. O’Gorman, P. Van Esbeck, J. O'Neill.

Replacements: I. Costello, W. Leahy, Brian Murphy, K. Flanagan, B. Madigan, S. Ryan.