{"id":69118,"date":"2025-10-09T09:12:07","date_gmt":"2025-10-09T09:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/69118\/"},"modified":"2025-10-09T09:12:07","modified_gmt":"2025-10-09T09:12:07","slug":"ireland-and-leinster-need-to-turn-things-around-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/69118\/","title":{"rendered":"Ireland and Leinster need to turn things around \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

As we inch ever closer to Saturday\u2019s World Cup qualifier against Portugal in Lisbon, there\u2019s a chance that the less hopeful among you are gathering up the cushions to cower behind come kick-off. Put it this way: Portugal are close enough to 100 places higher than Armenia in the Fifa rankings, and you know what happened in Yerevan. That defeat was, said Ireland\u2019s assistant manager John O\u2019Shea, \u201ca shock to the system\u201d<\/a>, but he still believes that this squad can produce so much better. <\/p>\n

Among the players hoping to do just that is Finn Azaz, Gordon Manning hearing from the Southampton midfielder who featured in 70 minutes of the calamitous Armenia game. \u201cWe all know that we\u2019ve let people down, let ourselves down<\/a>,\u201d he said. \u201cWe know it wasn\u2019t good enough and we\u2019re feeling we can really make a statement and put it right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Leinster need to turn things around too, if not from such a low starting point, having lost their first two URC games. John O\u2019Sullivan has a natter with R\u00f3nan Kelleher<\/a> ahead of their meeting with the Sharks on Saturday, the hooker refreshed after a five-week break following his spell on Lions\u2019 duty down under. <\/p>\n

Gordon Manning, meanwhile, brings news that Marc \u00d3 S\u00e9 has become the latest member of his clan to take charge of a Kerry team, the five-time All-Ireland winner appointed as his county\u2019s minor manager<\/a>, while his big brother Tom\u00e1s will remain in charge of the under-20 team.<\/p>\n

Ciar\u00e1n Murphy uses his column to marvel at the achievements of dual clubs<\/a>, 11 of the ones in action last weekend still in contention for a hurling-football double this season. <\/p>\n

In athletics, Ian O\u2019Riordan has news on the organisers of the Dublin Marathon scrapping their priority entry system<\/a>, a move aimed at increasing women\u2019s participation and the number of first-time runners.<\/p>\n

And in racing, Brian O\u2019Connor looks ahead to the winter jumps season<\/a>, which Horse Racing Ireland officially launched on Wednesday. \u201cThose suffering from Seasonal Affective Disorder, look away now,\u201d he says. Helping kick it off was none other than the \u201cseemingly ageless\u201d Willie Mullins, the man who has \u201credefined the parameters of jump racing success\u201d. <\/p>\n

TV Watch: There are three Irish players in the field for golf\u2019s Spanish Open, Conor Purcell, Tom McKibbin and a fella you might have heard of: Shane Lowry (Sky Sports Golf, from 1pm). Later, Scotland host Greece in their World Cup qualifying game at Hampden Park (BBC 2, 7.45) and England play their best buddies Wales in a friendly at Wembley (Virgin Media Two and UTV, 7.45).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As we inch ever closer to Saturday\u2019s World Cup qualifier against Portugal in Lisbon, there\u2019s a chance that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":69119,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[6937,61,60,46617,11287,43,1842,46618,1395,46616],"class_list":["post-69118","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-kerry-gaa","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-john-o-shea","tag-leinster-rugby","tag-news","tag-republic-of-ireland-mnt","tag-ronan-kelleher","tag-shane-lowry","tag-sports-briefing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69118\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/69119"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69118"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}