FOR THE ENTIRELY reasonable fee of 100 Canadian dollars [plus tax] you could be training with Irish footballer Darren O’Dea.
The former Celtic and Leeds defender, now with Toronto FC in Canada, will be hosting a professional players clinic on 21 April at the club’s training ground.
18-times capped with Ireland, O’Dea captains the Major League Soccer side and has settled in well to North American football. He followed up a forgettable outing in the 6-1 World Cup qualifier defeat to Germany with his first international goal, against the Faroe Islands, four days later.
The blurb on the Toronto FC site explains that would-be pros can ‘learn the tricks of the trade’ from some of the club’s best players.
Canadian international Terry Dunfield, formerly of Manchester City and Bury, will also feature at the Pro Player Clinic in two weeks’ time. Toronto are coached by Ryan Nelsen and have Robbie Earnshaw in their squad this season.
Another clinic will be coming up on 2 June but O’Dea will be hoping to feature for Ireland, against Georgia, at the Aviva Stadium that day.
If you have any football-mad cousins, or offspring, in Toronto, tell them to get down to show how to hit Row Z, Irish style.
A big advantage leinster have is that they have had competive games against very good opposition and still come into the game fresh.
Hopefully will conners chop tackles their ball carriers out of the game and the ref keeps their defencive line on side. Presure is firmly on the English too. Lose this and their year is over as a club where as leinster have the league title in the cabinet. So the season won’t end up a zero even if they are beat.
@Chris Mc: ah come on, having the pro 14 in the bag means zero to Leinster it’s a rubbish competition consisting of second and third string teams. It’s win or nothing for Leinster today !
@Darren Mullins: a 5 nation tournament means zero? Winning a single interpro match is a massive win. I’m sorry you have been spoilt but if you think the league is nothing ask any fan of the western province was winning the league meaningless.
@Darren Mullins: if it was meaningless why did they try so hard to win it?
@Rudiger McMonihan: Well Leinster’s best player and captain was on the bench rested for the final. So that tells a lot about how the competition is viewed.
@Gareth Ward: exactly it’s a joke of a competition!
@Chris Mc: if they could get the south African franchises to sign, then it would be a credible competition!!
Sarries by 3
@Cortiss: …thats an early morning ball hop anyway!! Match on now, Canterbury vs Taranaki and it is as good a rugby contest as I’ve seen in near 60 yrs. Try to catch a re-run if you want to be entertained. Its genuinely a classic.
Leinster by 12, they are just unstoppable
@Patrick O Connell: haha