The Bridge 2020 | Maynooth University Alumni Magazine

Lauren Kelly

Sports Roundup

Notwithstanding Covid-19 our MU athletes braved the sporting calendar this year with true commitment and competitiveness – domestically and internationally

Soccer

The 2019/20 season for Maynooth University Soccer Club was action packed from the get-go. Six intervarsity soccer squads – four men’s and two women’s – represented MU in third-level competition this year.

Despite reaching the quarterfinals in the Colleges and Universities Football League, our men’s senior squad suffered a 4-2 defeat against Carlow IT in early February, while our women’s seniors overcame UCC 3-1 in Cork in their semi-final to progress to the final. While both the MU women’s senior and men’s fresher teams togged out for their league finals, both teams were subsequently defeated by Ulster University and South West College respectively.

In the Irish Universities cups competitions, both women’s squads attempted to qualify for Intervarsity finals for the first time. Quarterfinal success for the women’s senior and B squads was overshadowed somewhat by Covid-19, which forced the cancellation of the finals at WIT in late March. Success in the Harding and Collingwood Cups on the other hand were in sight for a time for the men’s squads, who, despite convincing campaign matches, ultimately succumbed to defeat. UCD overcame a valiant MU effort in the Harding Cup final, while in the Collingwood Cup MU was defeated by UL in the quarterfinal. For the first time since 2014, Maynooth hosted the Crowley Cup. Home advantage in the

final against UCC saw the Maynooth boys winning the cup – for the second time in 50 years – in a 5-4 penalty shootout.

Turning our lens to MU scholar soccer watch 2020, former MU soccer scholar Amber Barrett continues to impress for her professional club FC Cologne and Ireland WNT. Sean Hoare has reached the Europa League group stages with Dundalk FC this year, while Scottish team Inverness Caledonian Thistle signed Business Management graduate and former scholarship winner Jamie McGrath. Luke McNally (St Patrick’s Athletic FC) and Daniel Grant (Bohemians FC) were both included in the Irish U21 squad this year. Current scholar Isibeal Atkinson was included in a preliminary women’s senior squad this year, while Lauren Kelly had an exceptional 2019-20 season, representing Ireland in Italy at the world university games. Lauren also scored twice for her club Wexford Youths in the Women’s FAI Cup final at the Aviva Stadium and was named Maynooth University Athlete of the year.

Maynooth University Town FC continued their march upwards through the Leinster Senior League divisions this year. For the first time in the club’s history, the senior squad gained promotion to the LSL Senior Division and finished fifth in a highly disrupted season. The Saturday squad, who also gained promotion to the Saturday major division for the first time, had an excellent third place finish while the development squad were Sunday Division 3 winners with an exciting final day of the season victory.

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Golf

Ireland’s leading student golfers continued to achieve success on the international stage thanks in part to the University’s Paddy Harrington Golf Scholarship Programme.

Class of 2020, Caolan Rafferty was selected to represent the international team against the USA in the Arnold Palmer Cup, an annual Ryder Cup style team match between the best international collegiate golfers and their US counterparts. Rafferty is the fourth golf scholar in program history to be selected to play in the prestigious Arnold Palmer Cup. Another coup for Maynooth this year saw Barry Fennelly, golf manager at MU, named as assistant men’s coach for the international team so it will be a unique double for the University having both a player and a coach represented in this prestigious cup. (It was due to be played in July at Lahinch golf club but will now take place at Bay Hill Club and Lodge in Florida Dec. 21-23, 2020.)

Remarkably, MU golf scholars have been represented at six of the last eight stagings of the Arnold Palmer Cups, a feat not matched by any institution outside of the United States.

In 2019, the R&A (the world governing body for golf) established a new elite student golf tour called the R&A Student Tour Series, which aims to raise the profile of student golf across Europe. In 2019-20, MU was the most represented institution throughout the four R&A Student Tour Series events. Maynooth hosted the R&A Student Tour Series Ireland at Carton House in September 2019 as the second event in the series and it was won in a playoff by Maynooth’s Josh Mackin. At the R&A Student Tour Series Spain in October 2019, Harry Gillivan finished runner-up with recent graduate Caolan Rafferty taking home bronze.

In February, Allan Hill shot a remarkable first round of 66(-6) for a new amateur course record at the R&A Student Tour Series at Troia but eventually settled for a silver medal having been pipped at the post by teammate Paul Conroy, who clinched the title by one stroke. MU’s Alan Fahy shot a final round 67(-5) to take home bronze at Troia, his third top 3 finish in the series, a placing that would eventually seal him the crown of R&A Student Tour Series order of merit champion. Fahy, who graduated in 2020 from Maynooth, went on to a superb season, winning the Bridgestone order of merit as the leading Irish men’s player in 2020 and earning a place on Golf Ireland’s 2021 high performance squad.

Rugby

Despite being cut short by the pandemic, the 2019-2020 season still proved very fruitful for MU rugby.

The women’s 1st XV followed up their emphatic Division 3 league victory of 2018-19 in similar fashion, securing back-toback league titles by winning Division 2 and gaining promotion to the top tier of Leinster Women’s Rugby. The introduction of a women’s scholarship programme three years ago has proved to be an incredible success, supplementing the growth of the club with a focused training regime, and offering talented school leavers a chance to develop in the next level. The growth of MU women’s squad has been exponential, with close to 50 at every training session and fielding two squads weekly this year for the first time. Stand-out performers were aplenty, with special praise going to Gorey duo Yvonne Hoey and Alice Canavan, along with Holly Leach, Katelynn Doran and Orfhlaith Murray.

In a similar trajectory, our men’s first XV picked up where they left

Alan Fahy

off in 2018-19. They stormed to the All-Ireland League 2B title by securing an amazing 18 wins from 18. The 2019-20 season began with much the same squad, together with a rigorous and tough preseason schedule, before embarking on the Division 2A campaign for the All-Ireland League. MU was quick off the mark with 10 wins in a row, bringing the MU winning streak to an incredible 28 wins on the bounce – the second highest in All-Ireland rugby history. Included in this was an historic victory in the University’s first attempt to lift the prestigious Dudley Cup, by defeating Queen’s University Belfast away from home in the dying moments of the match. Unfortunately the pandemic cut efforts to follow the women’s squad in securing back-to-back promotions as the league ceased with MU comfortably nestled on top of the league table after 14 rounds of games (4 to play) with 12 victories and only 2 defeats. Phenomenal performances from many with second row pairing Brendan McSorely and Dan Murphy dominating all in front of them, Darragh Bellanova proving a destructive scrummager, while first years Paddy Duggan and Matias Gianneti lit up the backline week in, week out.