Sports Review March

In March, a call went out for more GAA referees with only one person having signed up to do the foundation course. Westmeath’s GAA Referees Coordinator, Sean Sheridan, put out the call, pleading to every club to give him a name, “not just any name, someone who is interested in taking up the whistle”.

County Committee chairman, Frank Mescall added his voice, appealing to clubs, especially the ones who don’t to have referees, to get serious about recruitment. He pointed to a number of sanctions counties have in place for clubs who don’t have referees, such as fines and refusal to provide All-Ireland tickets. It was revealed that there were ten clubs in the county that did not have referees and they were urged to do something about it.

Karate pupils from all over Ireland took part in a squad training session at Mullingar Dojo in preparation for tournaments overseas while local Taekwon-Do instructor Rodney Connolly represented Ireland in the International Instructors Course in Orlando, Florida.

In the ring, Ballynacargy Boxing Club enjoyed a great spell with Robyn Kelly winning her seventh All-Ireland title and three others from this small club winning Leinster titles. Punching above their weight was a fitting cliché, but was not proving a barrier to their success.

Eighteen-year-old Robyn, daughter of coach Camillus Kelly, won her 7th title at the National Stadium, Dublin, when she out-classed her Neilstown opponent to capture the U22 title. She produced a strong, skilful display and forced her opponent to take a standing count twice in the opening round before the referee stopped the contest, declaring the Ballynacargy boxer the winner.

Sean Óg Brown, aged 11 years, boxed his way to Leinster glory in the Boy 1 Leinster final in Enniscorthy. Joining him was Boy 2 winner, 12-year-old Declan McGerr. Max McCormack was unlucky not to add to the club’s tally when he was denied after two superb rounds.

These boxers were following Eve Medforth aged 12 years who had recently been crowned Leinster champion and overcame a defending All-Ireland winner en route. Eve went on to capture the All-Ireland title in fine style in May and secured her place on the national team where she would join Robyn.

The Ballynacargy boxers were coached by Gordan Ward and Camillus Kelly. Camillus was delighted with the successes which he put down to the commitment of these young boxers to training three or four times a week. He said the club has just two coaches, compared to others clubs that have up to eight. “It’s difficult to recruit coaches because of the commitment involved,” he remarked.

Mullingar Tennis Club hosted the first Leinster competition of 2023 – the Spring Cup in which 12 clubs took part. John Hill, Laura Newman, Richie Forbes and Emer Meisonnave, representing Mullingar, had a tremendous win in the “B” section over Termonfeckin.

On the links, over 120 golfers competed in the first 18 hole competition of the season at Mullingar Golf Club. The overall winner was Dermot Maloney (22) with 37 stableford points, while the gross winner was David Tynan (1) with 29 points. The category winners were: Cat 1 (0-9), Paddy Dunne (5) with 31 points; Cat 2 (10-18), Brian McGinley (13) with 37 points; Cat 3 (19-28), David Keena (28) with 35 points.

The senior winner was Thomas Delaney (16) with 36 points and the junior winner was Aidan Isdell (21) with 32 points.

At the Murray Lambden Open Meeting walking events in the Isle of Man, brothers Andrew and Matthew Glennon from Mullingar Harriers secured qualification for the European racewalking team.

In handball, Robbie McCarthy Junior from Mullingar, reclaimed the Gael Linn Cup in Kingscourt, Cavan. Robbie cruised to a 9-1 lead in game one and, as his power was unstoppable, he went on to close out the game on a score-line of 21-10. He went on to win game two with a beauty of a centre court dump shot full of power.

This was McCarthy’s fifth senior singles 40x20 title and brought his senior All-Ireland medals haul to an impressive sweet 16.

It was very much a family affair when Kinnegad’s Dylan Powell became the Westmeath darts singles champion at Mullingar Shamrock GAA clubhouse. Dylan defeated his younger brother Keith in the final, having denied his father Ali in the penultimate round. Twenty eight throwers competed and there was some superb darts played, particularly in the semi-final between Keith Powell and Paddy Burke. The shield competition was won by Matthew Willoughby who defeated Jason Palmer in an exciting final.

John Heslin scored a whopping 1-12 as Westmeath senior footballers maintained their outside hopes of promotion in Division 2 with a surprisingly facile win against a very disappointing Antrim side at Cusack Park. Westmeath won by a landslide 31 points.

Meanwhile, the Westmeath senior hurlers produced a gutsy second half display against All-Ireland champions Limerick at TEG Cusack Park and, while they ultimately lost by 12 points, they performed well, despite being down a number of key players.