Irish Colleges Rugby News

Limerick Institute of Technology Rugby Team are heading to Derry to play the University of Ulster

Mayor of Derry to Host Limerick IT Rugby Team

Lynn Fleming the Lord Mayor of Derry is to host a Civic Reception next Monday in the Guildhall Derry to welcome the Limerick Institute of Technology Rugby Team to the City. The Limerick students are the current All Ireland Colleges Rugby Champions. They are in the city to play the University of Ulster in a game to mark the 125th Anniversary Celebrations of City of Derry Rugby Club.

Limerick IT will face a team comprising players from the Universities of Magee, Coleraine and Jordanstown in this special game which is also being played to coincide with the local Banks of the Foyle Halloween Festival. There will be a number of City of Derry players on the UU Team including the Duffy twins, Stephen Corr and David Houston.

LIT will have players from the following clubs in Munster Shannon, Garryowen, Young Munster and Clonakilty. They have a number of high profile players in their ranks including Conan Doyle the current Garryowen and Irish U-21 out half. He has already played for the Munster Senior Team this season in the Celtic League. They also have Fergal Lawlor the Ireland U-19 Captain who is currently playing AIL Rugby with Shannon. The other Shannon players include Pat O Connor and Brian Moran son of Oggie Moran the former Kerry Gaelic Football Captain and member of the famous Kerry Four in a Row Team. They also have Paul Dillon who played for Clonakilty last weekend against City of Derry.

Maria Hinfelaar the Director of Limerick Institute of Technology said It s a great honour to be asked to partake in this fixture and offers the college a chance to be part of some very positive North South Co-operation . Jim Allen Pro Vice Chancellor at Magee University said He hoped this game would be the forerunner for participation in other sports between the two colleges and lead to closer links educationally .

The game itself was the brainchild of Moss Dineen the City of Derry Rugby Club President and also President of the Irish Colleges Rugby Union, Moss said This game sees the best college team in the country LIT playing in Derry for the first time and allowing our students the chance to gauge the standard they need to aspire to. It is also a great opportunity to promote rugby in our third level institutions. This game also allows us to promote our City and its unique Halloween Festival. There has always been a great relationship between Limerick Rugby Teams and City of Derry and we hope this will be further enhanced by this truly exciting fixture.

The game itself will kick off at City of Derry Rugby Club Judge s Road on Monday @ 2pm and will be one of the show pieces for the Derry festival over the Bank Holiday weekend.

Terenure RFC, Lakelands, was the setting for the first ICRU event of the year. The annual 7 s competition took place on Tuesday 11th October with 14 team s venturing out on a cold October morning. The teams were split up into two groups of 3 and two groups of 4, with some strong sides in each. As the morning progressed it seemed group 4 was going to be the tightest of them all, with the Garda College and GMIT Castlebar both winning their opening two games. It was a closely fought game with the team s level on 7 points all for much of the second half. However, a great try by Castlebar sealed their victory and the match ended 14-7. Group 3 saw 3 time winners A.I.T. up against GMIT Galway, D.K.I.T. and NUI Maynooth. After the group games it was the boys from Galway who topped the bill to go through to the semis. Group 1 was an all Dublin affair with IT Tallaght, DCU and Griffith College. Tallaght ended up being easy group winners and were looking favourites to go all the way. Finally group 2 saw the always strong Limerick IT against R.C.S.I. and D.I.T. L.I.T. ended up being the group winners, but only after a closely fought battle with R.C.S.I., who will prove to be tough opposition this season in Division 2.

So the semi-final line up saw IT Tallaght take on Limerick IT and it was an all GMIT affair with Castlebar against Galway. A very physical game between Tallaght and Limerick saw the Dublin boys go onto the final with a 12-7 victory. In the other semi, a place in the final was not the only thing up for grabs; the bragging rights for Galway were available too. This proved to be another tough game for the Castlebar boys who had played with pride throughout the entire competition. Unfortunately, the skill of GMIT Galway was too much and they ran out 19-12 winners.

So onto the final – GMIT Galway vs. IT Tallaght. Tallaght went into the game the fitter of the two, with strong freshers on board. As it turned out most of the final was dominated by Tallaght, and they ended up winning comfortably by 31-14. Congratulations to IT Tallaght and Eoin Hogan on winning the ICRU Heineken 7 s competition 2005.

A big thank you to all the teams for taking part and for making the effort to travel up and to some of our Referee s Barry Hilliard, Ronan Carroll, Stephen Gore and the Garda College Referee (apologies for no name). Also a special thank you to Eoin Hogan for organising the entire event!

Good luck for the rest of the season

ICRU TOURNAMENT