Waterford Look to Maintain Winning Ways in Cork

Both Waterford and Cork put their 100 per cent record in this year’s National Camogie League on the line on Sunday afternoon as the pair are set to do battle in the third series of games at the Cork Camogie Grounds.

Both sides had wins in the opening round of games as All-Ireland Champions Cork ran out three point winners on a 0-10 to 0-7 score line against Tipperary at The Ragg, the home of Tipperary Camogie two weeks ago and last weekend the Rebellettes were set to have home advantage over Wexford in the second round of games, but the Model County right now are finding themselves in all sorts of trouble when it comes to senior Inter county Camogie, only able to muster up 16 players to line out against Waterford in the opening round of games and have seen their team manager walk away in recent weeks and were forced to concede a walkover last weekend the day before their scheduled visit to Lee-side.

Waterford had an excellent 1-13 to 1-5 win over Wexford in the first round of games two weeks ago and last weekend they had no game, as it was their turn to have a bye in a group of five times in Group 2.

In that win over Wexford you might not think it from the final result but Waterford manager Donal O’Rourke had to plan without the services of the Gailltir players in his panel as they planned for last weekend’s All-Ireland Semi Final against Offaly side Saint Rynagh’s, a game that the Sky Blues ran out winners on a 3-8 to 0-12 score line and therefore with an All-Ireland coming up in four weeks time it can be expected that the Cappoquin Club Man will have to plan without the services of the players from the County Champions for this game and possibly the remainder of the league.

The two sides met in the Munster Championship at Modeligo just under 12 months ago and on that occasion while the now All-Ireland Champions ran out winners it has to be pointed out that the side in white and blue really put it up to the visitors on that occasion and on another day with different circumstances victory could well have gone to the home side.

Because of that performance even without the possible exclusion of the Gailltir players this Waterford side will travel to Cork tomorrow morning full of confidence that they can pull off a memorable win.

Over the winter months Donal O’Rourke and his management team have added shrewdly to his panel for this year’s competition.

The bulk of last year’s panel which narrowly missed out on a place in the semi finals of the league and which reached the quarter finals of the championship are involved again this year.

Brianna O’Regan will once again be in goal, while Sibeal Harney, Iona Heffernan, Mairead Power, Aoife Landers, Caoimhe McGrath if she is up to playing two inter county games in 24 hours having lined out for the county lady footballers earlier today against Wexford and possible Sadie Mai Rowe could all once more feature in front of the De La Salle Club player with the number one on her back.

In the middle of the field Lorraine Bray and Clara Griffin got off to a good start together last time out and the pair could well be paired together again against Cork this weekend.

Up front Beth Carton is a certainty to start if fully fit and her contribution is going to be vital for Waterford.

But Waterford do no rely on the De La Salle sharp shooter solely. In team captain Waterford have a brilliant leader in Niamh Rockett. What the Saint Anne’s Club player adds to any team has to be seen to be believed. Kaiesha Tobin from Dungarvan is a player with a very bright future while her Dungarvan club mate Sarah Lacey last time out had a debut to remember against Wexford hitting two points.

Shona Curran who played both Camogie and Ladies Football in the past for Waterford is back in the Waterford set up this year and her contribution and experience cannot be under estimated.

Others that could come in from the start in this game for Waterford could well be Keeley Corbett –Barry a member of the minor team that beat Cork in last year’s Munster Final and who made her senior debut coming on as a sub against Wexford, while the likes of Sadie Mai Rowe, the very reliable Orla Hickey, Niamh Ahearne, Niamh Murphy and Sally Kelly.

Claire Whyte and Deirdre Fahy did not feature against Wexford. Both are two very experienced players and barring any injuries which are not generally known of both will be looking to get some game time this weekend in the white and blue of Waterford.

And what of Cork?. Well we know that they will not be an easy side to get the better of.

We also know that they will have a very strong side out against Waterford as they will want to lose points as they know that they have another tricky assignment coming up against Galway, and will know that if they were to lose out here it could well mean that they could miss out on a place in the last four of the competition.

Against Tipperary they had a very strong team out and could well have the same team out for this game meaning that Aoife Murray will start in goal with Leanne O’Sullivan, Laura Treacy and Laura Hayes in front of her and have Hannah Looney, Gemma O’Connor and Chloe Sigerson on the 50 yard line.

In the middle of the field Ashing Thompson and Libby Coppinger are a very experienced pair at this level while further up the field Siobhain Hutchinson, Orla Cronin and Amy O’Connor could be tasked with watching the Waterford half backs while Orla Cotter, Linda Collins and Cliona Healy could be in the inside forward line.

The Cork management team sent the experienced Briege Corkery on against Tipperary and they could well ask her to play from the off this time out if they want to start with as strong as team as is possible this Sunday.

Saoirse and Ciara McCarthy are two young players introduced by Cork manager Paudie Murray this year and it will be interesting to see will they get a run in this game.

Experienced players like Julia White as well as Katriona and Pamela Mackey are also set to return to the Cork fold sooner rather than later while Niamh McCarthy will expected to return to the Cork fold after her club side Inniscarra exited the All-Ireland Club Championship recently.

It is a pity that Gaelic Games supporters do not get to see more Camogie games than we actually do live on the TV every weekend. There certainly are enough stations out there that if they were really interested in promoted in women’s sport to have at least one game on live every Saturday and Sunday throughout the league and championship for supporters to watch.

There is some that will argue that if there was live coverage on one of the free-to-air channels it would affect the attendances. This however would be nonsense, but there is ways and means around it as the TV stations would not have to reveal beforehand which game they were going to show life as most games tend to have a 2pm or a 2-30pm start.

If one of the TV stations were to show games live, then surly the clash of Cork and Waterford this Sunday would have to be the game they would show.

Cork will go into this game as favourites, but we all know that favourites even in a two horse race don’t always win. Following on from their most recent competitive outing and building on what was achieved last year, even without the services of the Gailltir players Waterford will travel to Cork confident that they can pull off what many would describe as a shock win. Will this happen? We will have to wait and see.