HUGO KEENAN HEADS to Croatia this weekend to continue his Olympic preparation with the Ireland Men’s Sevens squad.
The Leinster and Ireland XVs star made his long-awaited return to the small-sided game last week at the Madrid Grand Final of the SVNS Series, where Ireland finished fifth.
Head coach James Topping has opted to rest the majority of his most familiar faces for this week’s Rugby Europe Championship, which begins in Makarska on Friday.
But Keenan, Connacht’s Andrew Smith and Hugo Lennox have all been retained as they continue to prepare ahead of Paris 2024.
Meanwhile, Kathy Baker returns to the Ireland Women’s squad having missed the final rounds of the SVNS Series through injury while Madrid debutant Katie Corrigan remains part of Allan Temple-Jones’ panel.
Ireland Men’s Sevens
Josh Costello, James Dillon, Nick Greene, Hugo Keenan, Jack Kelly, Ed Kelly, Joshua Kenny, Hugo Lennox, Zac McConnell, Matthew McDonald, Bryan Mollen, Connor O’Sullivan, Andrew Smith.
Ireland Women’s Sevens
Kathy Baker, Natasja Behan, Claire Boles, Aoife Corey, Katie Corrigan, Alanna Fitzpatrick, Clare Gorman, Lucinda Kinghan, Amy Larn, Kate Farrell McCabe, Anna McGann, Emma Tilly, Vikki Wall.
Fixtures
Friday, June 7
Ireland Women v Czech Republic, 10.58am
Ireland Men v Croatia, 1.50pm
Ireland Women v Turkey, 4.08pm
Ireland Men v Germany, 6.38pm
Saturday, June 8
Ireland Women v France, 11.20am
Ireland Men v Georgia, 1.28pm
– All times Irish Summer Time.
God English football is becoming more and more like the NFL. This tiny thing that means nothing. If your going to show support do something meaningful. Not change the corner flags for a week
I think the only people that care about being gay are gay people. The majority of society couldnt give a rolax!!
Ridiculous stuff. No one cares if a lad is gay, straight, bi, trans, whatever…as long as he’s getting fantasy points
@Theresonly1Liamo123: Too much people care! If only people minded their own beeswax there would be no need for these flags.
@Coner Willis: My eyes hurt reading that. It should say, Too many people not too much people.
Look at all the straight people telling minorities that there’s no such thing as oppression . Why have no gay footballers come out? With all the players in the premier league you’d imagine there has to be at least a few gay lads. I think it’s because the asian market is massive to the epl and also a lot of Asian and African countries are still living in the 1950′s when it comes to gay rights etc. Truly believe there are gay footballers who are warned against coming out of the closet
@William Motley: Haha ! And you think having rainbow corner flags is going to make them come out. Daft bullshit.
@Mike Flannery: it’s a step in the right direction.
@Ger: bs. So if there is a homophobic element in the stands, forcing their teams’ to adopt rainbow flags if going to make the problem go away? If anything it will make people worse and all this will do is paper over the cracks and have mullets getting more vocal, causing arguments among their own fans.
@deano connors: no one is forcing clubs to adopt rainbow flags or laces. It is up to individual clubs Thankfully most (but not all) clubs do. Will it make homophobic fans less homophobic? Of course not. The boot racism out of football initiative didn’t stop racists being racist but it drastically decreased the amount of racist abuse from the stands in English football. To the point where being caught using racist language can get you a lifetime ban from the ground. This is what can and will happen with homophobic abuse eventually, which is what this is a step in the right direction towards. As a gay man who played competitive team sports as a teen I would have felt a lot more at ease in my surroundings had there been something like this when I played.
@William Motley: I’m laughing here . It’s sport. What the hell does someone sexuality matter . If the guy is doing his job ,who the hell cares about anything else . Are we so pc mad that it’s become a joke . We used to just enjoy the beautiful game for what it was. Now football is non contact ,no lauguage . Sad very sad
Ref no way is that a goal kick. Stonewall corner…..
What a load of cobblers and typical of this bleeding heart ridiculous generation
Most of us don’t want to know what anybody else’s orientations are. What has it got to do with football or any other occupation?
This ridiculous token does LG** more harm than good.
More politics in sport by the Brits.