Team News

 This week we saw a great start weatherwise but it then quickly deteriorated meaning most matches were cancelled due to the unplayable conditions at the week-end. We were delighted to see Daire Newcombe line-out for the division 2 league final where Dublin managed to breakdown the strong defensive record of Derry. Best of Luck to Finn Bruton who is lining out for Dublin U20s vs Offaly tomorrow 4th April.

Camogie 

Sunday was a historic day for the club – winning two Leinster league Camogie titles at the National GAA Centre in Abbotstown. Proudly sporting the new jerseys sponsored by Blackrock Health Hermitage Clinic, our Senior Camogie team lined out against St Cillian’s from Offaly in the Division 1 Final, while our Junior A team played Trim of Meath in the Division 4 Final. 

Playing on a manicured grass pitch on a perfect day for Camogie our senior team were first off the mark and went into an early lead; in a highly competitive and exciting game Lucan went on to lead at half time by 0.08 to 0.03. Lucan continued to notch up points in the second half, giving few opportunities to St Cillian’s to threaten their lead. With five minutes to go, Sophie McIntyre took her goal opportunity, putting the game out of reach of St Cillians. Lucan ran out winners on a scoreline of 1-14 to 0-6. 

Captain Emma Flanagan accepted the trophy from Linda Kenny, chairperson of Leinster Camogie. In her acceptance speech, Emma expressed her delight to be bringing the cup home for a second year in a row.

Team : Amy Gorman, Cara Ware, Avril Quinn, Rachel Boyhan, Hannah Brady, Laura Sharkey, Lily Rooney, Emma Flanagan, Ellen Dunphy, Laura Quinn, Emma O’Brien, Faye Murphy, Leah Dunne, Sophie McIntyre, Rebecca Flanagan, Phoebe Shannon, Aoife Mahon, Roisin Egan, Sinead O’Toole, Sinead Farrell 

Management : Kevin Fennelly, Aidan Coffey, Jim Langton, Orla Rooney, Fintan McKearney 

Meanwhile on the All weather pitch, the Junior team fought a close battle with Trim, pulling away in the latter stages with 2 goals leaving their final score on 3-10 to 0-8. 

Football

LGFA Division 2 Go-Ahead Adult Cup, Lucan 0-11 Templeogue Synge Street 1-11

Lucan ladies had a warm-up game against Confey on the Monday preceding their first cup game. Lucan stayed well in control for much of the game and in last 4 minutes conceded two late goals for Confey to reduce their deficit. Final Score Lucan Sarsfields 6-8, 5-7 Confey. 

Next game was a Cup fixture at home v Tempelogue Synge St. A very close encounter with TSS edging it by a goal. Lucan host TSS again but this time in the League next Wednesday 5th at 6:45.

LGFA Junior A – Division 5 Cup Match v Castleknock 29/03/2023 

With 10 weeks of football training and gym work completed, our first match of 2023 would be a Division 5 Cup game against our near neighbours Castleknock in AGP3 on Wednesday 29th of March at 6.30pm. Having being promoted to Division 5 in 2022, and after achieving our goal of a top half of the table finish, the challenge now would be to maintain and improve on that for 2023. 

Having played Castleknock 3 times in 2022 with 1 win and 2 narrow defeats, we knew this was always going to be a tough one, and so it proved to be. On what turned out to be a dry but very windy evening in Griffeen, we decided to avail of the elements in the first half. The first 15 minutes was the expected cagey affair, with both sides giving it everything. However, our plan to maximise the elements in the first half was not really materialising, as the score stood at 1-4 to 1-2 in our favour after the first quarter. Full credit to Castleknock, they carried some great ball in numbers against the wind, in these early stages. While our defence at times looked at 6s and 7s, you could see them start to settle and organise things better. Gradually towards the end of the first half, we got a better hold on things, as our defence settled down, and worked well with our tireless midfielders. We had now started to work the ball well up the field to our forwards who were combining well together. However, scores were hard to come by, not helped by the blustery wind which couldn’t seem to make its mind up on what direction it was coming from. However, our patient possession game started to pay dividends, as towards the end of the first half we rattled off 2 points from play and another 2 well taken frees, to leave us ahead by 1-7 to 1-3 at the break. 

While happy with the performance as we finished the first half, the girls knew that a 4 point lead against the wind would make for an uncomfortable 2nd half. They knew that they would need to up the work rate and intensity, if they were to have any chance of getting the win. Full credit to them, that’s exactly what they did. Really playing as a unit now, the defence as a whole worked on the ‘thou shalt not pass’ ethos, and despite numerous Castleknock attacks early on, it was Lucan who got the first scores early in the second half. You could see the girl’s confidence building at this stage, with all 15 putting in a huge effort of maximising possession when we had the ball, and defending in numbers when we didn’t. The start of the final quarter saw Castleknock finally making use of the wind and with less than a few minutes to go, they had it back to 2 points, and were pushing hard for more scores. However some staunch defending and one cracking save in particular by our goalie, kept the Castleknock score board frozen during these last few minutes. It was the Lucan girls who drove back up the field to score the decisive goal that gave us a 5 point lead, which we held onto, to eventually give us a 2-9 to 1-7 win.  

This was truly a 17 player effort, with everyone giving 100% from start to finish. Nice to start the year with a win, but the real business starts next week in the league against ………Castleknock again.  

Team: 1. Aileen Walsh 2. Audrey Murtagh 3. Cara Ware 4. Niamh Stokes 5. Aoife Whelan 6. Aisling Kavanagh 7. Ali Dunne 8. Erris Smith 9. Leah Dunne 10. Roisin Egan 11. Aoibheann Scott 12. Sadhbh Murray 13. Ellie Wisdom 14. Mia Dunne 15. Bella Fay 16. Bevin Kelleher 17. Niamh Roche  

Go Ahead AFL1, Lucan Sarsfields 1-09 Kilmacud Crokes 1-09, 29th March 2023 

Our Senior football team faced their toughest challenge so far this season when reining All-Ireland Champions Kilmacud Crokes came to the 12th Lock on Wednesday night. The weather was kind and a dry night helped get a large crowd up to support the Senior team as they put their 100% winning start on the line. The U-12 boys team gave the Kilmacud team a guard of honour at the start of the game in recognition of their recent All-Ireland win. 

Once the ball was thrown it was very clear that the Lucan team were determined to disrupt Kilmacud and never allowed them to get into their familiar possession based patterns. Some turnovers won from hard tackling gave Lucan a platform to kick 4 good points in the opening Qtr and take a two point lead. The game had more of a championship feel as both teams were forcing mistakes with high intensity tackling. Despite the pressure from Crokes, Lucan maintained the two point advantage as the game approached half time with Brendan Gallagher and Jack Lawlor scoring 5 points between them. Then Crokes swept the full length of the field to find the net with a crucial goal just on half time to give them a one point lead. With the wind at their backs for the 2nd half, Crokes increased their lead to 3 points with 2 early scores in the 2nd half. With a man advantage following a black card to CJ Smith the game looked in danger of getting away from Lucan as Crokes began to find the rhythm that delivered back to back Dublin championships. The game took a dramatic swing back to Lucan when Colm Behan finished a flowing move with a palmed finish to the net to draw the game level. Crokes continued to play well but Lucan managed to twice edge in front in the closing 10mins thanks to two superb points from play from Mark Lavin. Unfortunately for Lucan, Kilmacud kept their composure and manufactured a scoring opportunity for Hugh Kenny to kick the levelling score from distance 2 mins into injury time. The referee allowed plenty of additional time for both teams to snatch a win but in the end both teams had to be satisfied with a point in this hard fought game.  

The draw puts Lucan on 7 pts and sitting on top of AFL1 after 4 games. A long season ahead but a strong start for this new look team. Special mention for Luke Gavigan who made his competitive debut for Lucan having moved from his home club in Donegal as he is stationed and living in the area. Luke comes from a strong football pedigree in Donegal and we wish him all the best in Lucan. 

Next up for Lucan is another home game against Ballyboden St Enda's on Sat 22nd April at 6pm in the 12th Lock. Hopefully there will be an equally large home support at that game as it made a huge difference in such a tight game against Kilmacud. 

AFL Div 6: Garristown 1-6 Lucan Sarsfields 5-23 2nd April

Last time out it was a draw, but it was difficult to know if it was a winning or losing feeling. Today we were left with a very similar sense. The Garristown pitch, despite all the rain, was in decent condition, but it still left for very slippery conditions. There was an awful lot of passes going astray, dropped balls and bone crunching collisions. 

The home team are undefeated in 2 years, and they started about their work like a team with lots of confidence. 

They had a range of different scorers, a big solid midfield and a ferocious defence. There was a sense that generally Lucan found it much more difficult to build scores. 

Lady Luck may not have favoured Lucan, but Garristown were always aggressively pushing that luck in their own direction. By the end of the first quarter, Lucan trailed 0-1 v 0-5. It could have been worse, Garristown were profligate. At the other end, Lucan had less opportunity and a lot less time, but had also passed up some excellent opportunities. 

The 2nd quarter belonged narrowly to Lucan, as they began to get to grips with both the conditions and the opposition. A 3 point half time gap seemed a very reasonable springboard to the second half. 

It began with some frantic end to end football. No scores, but plenty of close shaves. Looking on, it felt as though the wind was coming round behind the visitors, but the slippery conditions were about to intervene. A quick fire 1-1, against the run of play, pushed Garristown 7 points clear. The wind that shortly before, had seemed to be at our backs, could now be heard escaping from our momentum. Lucan bravely picked themselves up, and would keep battling till the end, but were never able to reduce the gap to less than 6. 

Tommy brought his best scoring boots, Jordan too. Dean will have gained from the experience at the hands of such an aggressive defence. Adam, was a 2nd half sub and slotted a beautiful goal. Gareth and Declan joined the cause. 

Peter was picking up a lot of ball, and prompting Lucan’s offence, but it was the ball carrying of Louis & Brendan that was producing the most likely route to goal. 

It was a difficult day for all of the midfielders. A wet ball and a lot of bodies. Tim and James just about broke even. Back in the engine room all the lads had their sleeves rolled up. Conor made at least 3 excellent saves. Colm, Michael, Niall, Jack, Callum & Tony gave nothing less than 100%. Lucan had difficulty scoring, but I’m sure the home team management probably felt that the same was true. 

A special mention for Seamus. He’s made a recent habit of those bursts into the heart of the opposing defence. There were a couple more today. So far he’s winning kickable frees. I have a feeling that there’s a screamer into the top corner coming! He hobbled ashore from one of those aforementioned crunching collisions!!Bloody but unbowed. Although he had to let some crazy guy drive his car home. Who’d have thought Max Verstappen hangs around N County Dublin? 

Finally, we got a message before the game from our under the weather, goalie. It was brilliant to hear that Dean is home from hospital, and we’re all looking forward to his return. Really finally. Garristown 2-15 v 1-10 Lucan. A defeat, but one in which there is no shame, and from which much will have been learnt. Is that a positive? 

Team: C O’Flynn, M Young, C Kelly, N Murray, C Buchanan, S Keher, T Mulqueen, T Bradley, J Finn, L Butler, P Carroll, B Kavanagh, J Delmar (0-2), D Walsh, T Brennan (0-8) 

Subs: J O’Toole, A Dunne (1-0), G Linehan, D Lawlor, S Kerins  

Social News & Events

Past Players of Jim McCarthy are welcome to return for a memorial match on the 3rd anniversary of his passing. See you in the Club on the 15th April at 5pm.

Lotto

No Winner of last week’s Lotto Prize of €16,600.

The Numbers were 3, 11, 13, 19.

The lucky dip prizes go to, Mary Freeman, Rory Stapleton, Paul Heneghan, Donal Downes, Joseph Hegarty  

Next week’s Lotto will be for a jackpot of €17,000. The draw is sponsored by Clandillon Motors and will be led by Shay Hurson.

Tá €17,000 sa phota óir don tseachtain seo chugainn agus is é urraitheoir na seachtaine:

Beidh sé beo ón Na Sárséalaigh Leamhcáin, an leathanach Facebook.

Déan cinnte go bhfuil d’iontráil curtha isteach agaibh roimh 6 i.n. oíche an chrannchuir, chun í a chur san áireamh sa chrannchur na seachtaine sin.

The draw will be held on Thursday 6^th April, at 9pm and is streamed from Lucan Sarsfields Clubhouse, on our Facebook page.

Make sure your entry is submitted before 6pm on the evening of the draw to be included in that week’s draw.

féidir libh ticéadaí a cheannacht ar líne leis an nasc seo:

Tickets can be purchased online at the following link:

http://bit.ly/LucanSarsfieldsClubLotto,

Go raibh míle maith agaibh as ucht tacú le Na Sárséalaigh Leamhcáin

Thank You for supporting Lucan Sarsfields GAA Club.