This article is from page 70 of the 2011-04-12 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 70 JPG
THERE seems to be no stopping Clare’s juvenile handball players as they captured yet another title at the weekend, adding to the previous weekends tally of five titles.
Last out for Clare last weekend saw Aine McInerney and Hannah O’Brien take on a formidable Kilkenny pairing in the under 17 girls doubles in Goresbridge, Kilkenny.
The Clare girls were going in as underdogs but were quietly hoping to emulate their Clare comrades in Alice Akers and Stacey Wright who captured this same title twelve months previous.
Kilkenny started the strongest and forced their way into a 6-0 lead, but the clare girls were resilient and battled back to draw level.
It was a nip and tuck affair with points and hands exchanging on a regular basis. Kilkenny went in to serve for the first game with two hands at 20-18, but the Clare duo fought back to regain the service advantage and clinch a very close first game. What now originally seemed a mountain to climb now seemed to be a great possibility.
And the Clare girls were not to dis- appoint as they started the second game as they finished the first and gained a blistering 12-0 lead.
The finishing line was in their sights and while the Kilkenny girls tried to rally back, it was Clare who took the game and the title to make it an historic 40×20 season for Clare juvenile handball.
Clare juvenile handball is now by far the strongest in Ireland and this is evident by the number of All-Ireland Titles that Clare have won this year – an incredible six out of a possible 15 which makes the county the envy of every other centre in the country.
At local level, the Clare county B doubles get under way this week in all divisions and clubs have been notified of fixtures.