Tom Walsh Memorial Blitz

Tom Walsh Memorial Blitz

Congratulations to our 1st year hurlers and their coaches Mr Kennealy and Mr Joyce on winning today s blitz. Conditions in the morning were difficult for hurling but some hard fought entertaining games resulted in Good Counsel College facing St. Kierans College in the Final. A close fought contest turned on a great goal from Cian Byrne, named as player of the tournament, with 5 minutes remaining. Dylan Whelan collected the Tom Walsh Cup on behalf of his team mates from former pupil Thomas O Connor who has just signed a new professional contract with Southampton FC. Huge thanks goes to Mr L O Brien, Mr D Wall and Mr PJ Walsh along with the TY and 5th years for organising a wonderful event. Shane O Hanlon from Wexford and Leinster GAA presented the Player of the Tournament award to Cian and O Neill s Sliotars to each player on the winning GCC team.

Shane Power National Junior Men Pole Vault Champion

Congrats to Shane Power, Kiltown, The Rower on winning the National Junior Men Pole Vault championship on Sunday Jan 28th in the AIT International Arena in Athlone. In recent weeks Shane was a guest in both the Munster U19 & Munster junior men championships where he won both pole vault competitions. Shane has added this junior men National title to his U18

National title, Leinster junior men & U18 titles he won last year Shane is now solely concentrating on pole vaulting and it is paying off. Well done Shane. Wonderful achievement! 1916 Football Enda s, Dublin versus Thank you to Ms Linda Rogers for bringing this to our attention. St

South Leinster Schools

Athletics SCHOOLS ATHLETICS SUCCESS Joe Mooney on his way to Gold Oisin Griffin Good Counsel College winning the boys Junior 2,000 m race

Good Counsel had a very successful outing in the South Leinster Schools Athletics in Scanlon Park, Kilkenny on Tuesday 29th of April. The 1st year 4 100 metres relay was the first event for the lads with Sam Sutton, Killian Griffin, Rory O Connor, and Jack Elliot making up the team. They qualified for the final with a comfortable victory in the heat and put in an even better performance to win gold in the final and progress to the Leinster Finals. The 200 meters was the next event on the card and the school had 2 students running in the heats, both making their debut at this distance. Both put in good performances with Conor Cassidy (2 nd year) coming in 4 th and Liam Doocey (1 st Year) coming in 5th in their respective heats. The next event saw Joe Mooney representing the school in the 3km senior walk. He won gold in convincing style, breaking the South Leinster Schools record by 20 seconds and progresses to the Leinster Finals. In the 500 meters Sam Sutton (1st year) was making the step up to a longer distance and was making his debut in this event. th He ran very well and finished an excellent 5 place. Killian Griffin (1st year), Kevin Wallace, Mike Chapman, and Aaron Brown all ran in the 800 metres. In the u-14 race rd Killian finished 3 and qualified for the Leinster finals. Kevin ran a very good race in his first competitive athletics outing and finished in the top half of the race. Mike and Aaron acquitted themselves very well in the u-15 race with Aaron finishing an excellent 5th place. Jack Elliot (1st Year) and Cian Flanagan (1st Year) were both competing in the 100 metres. Cian finished 4th in his heat but

ran very well. Despite losing his shoe, Jack won his heat well and progressed to the final. In the final Jack once again turned on the afterburners and romped home, taking Gold as well as progressing to the Leinster finals. Next up was the 75 metres hurdles where Rory O Connor (1 st Year) ran two very good races to take a silver medal and progress to the Leinster Finals. The final races of the day were the 1100 and 1500 metres. Running in the 1100 metres were Luke Byrne (1 st Year) and Raymond Roche (1st Year). Both ran excellent races with Luke just missing out on a medal, finishing in 4 th. In the 1500 metres Oisin Griffin (2nd Year) and Eoin Ryan (2nd Year) took to the line. Both ran well, with Oisin finishing 4th. It was an excellent day out for the school and well done to all the athletes who competed. Best of luck to those progressing to Leinster Finals. Our Intermediate and Senior Athletes also competed successfully on May 6th in Scanlon Park at the South Leinster Track & Field finals. Best results on the day were second place in the Senior relay final (Paul Manning, Gary Murphy, Adam Mansfield, Jack Burford), First in Intermediate High Jump (Ryan Carthy Walsh) and first in Intermediate Pole Vault (Shane Power). Our Minor and Junior athletes travelled to the Leinster finals in Santry on Wednesday 13 t h May with results of note as following Jack Elliott 5th in Minor sprint, Killian Griffin 8th in 1500m, Rory O Connor 6th in 80m hurdles. Our minor relay team came sixth in the final. A huge note of thanks goes to Mrs Annette Quegan who mentored the boys on the day.

Next was the intermediate and Senior Leinster Finals in Santry last Saturday 16th May. Huge congrats go to Ryan Carthy Walsh who was only 1cm off the National record in the Intermediate High Jump and while jumping 2.03m, successfully made qualification for the European youth athletics finals. This was followed up with Joe Mooney s remarkable success in the Senior 3000m walk, running away with it to pardon the pun! Again thanks to all parents who accompanied their sons on the day. A great year so far but fingers crossed and best of luck to all boys in the National finals. U-16 Hurling All Ireland Semi Final Good Counsel College have progressed to the Masita All-Ireland Post Primary Schools Junior Hurling Final having overcome Presentation College, Athenry in an enthralling encounter on a score line of 2-17 to 1-17 on Saturday 15th of November. The Semi-Final was originally due to be played in Templemore, Tipperary but due to a waterlogged pitch was moved to the University of Limerick. The artificial surface and dry conditions facilitated a fast free-flowing game of extremely high quality. Good Counsel started slowly in front of their travelling support and found themselves behind early on as Athenry s full forward line were proving very dangerous, in particular the Clarenbridge duo of Mark Kennedy and Evan Niland. The slow start coupled with some wasteful shooting saw Good Counsel trailing 1-7 to 0-2 after fifteen minutes and needing an

excellent save from goal keeper, Jack Byrne-Doyle, to keep them in the game. This proved a wake-up call for the New Ross boys as they displayed incredible character and no little skill as they fought back to take control of the game. They started to reduce the deficit with some excellent scores as the forwards began to click and the defence got to grips with the Athenry attack. An excellent individual goal from influential mid-fielder, Thomas O Connor, inspired a period of play which saw Good Counsel dominate the game and go in level at half time 1-9 to 1-9. It was during this period that Athenry also lost a midfielder to a straight red card for a foul on centreforward, Mark O Neill, as he ran at the heart of the defence. The teams exchanged scores early in the second half and after ten minutes the score was 1-12 a-piece. It was the Galway side who then took the initiative briefly and moved into a two point lead which was quickly reduced to one as Luke Sinnott pointed a free following some good work from Jimmy Sutton. The most crucial score of the second half came soon after this as Sinnott won an excellent ball close to the end line, beat his man and finished calmly to the net. The teams again exchanged scores as the game approached the final ten minutes, the pick of the bunch was an excellent point from Good Counsel s Rory Higgins from out on the wing. Good Counsel then had corner back, Richard Hennessy, dismissed for a second bookable offence towards the end of the game but they managed to see the game out as Jim Ryan finished the scoring and sent the New Ross school through to the AllIreland Final where they will face a formidable Middleton C.B.S side next Saturday, November 22nd (Venue TBC). Scorers: Thomas O Connor 1-4, Luke Sinnott 1-3 (0-2f, 0-1 65), Mark O Neill 0-3, Jim Ryan 0-3, Sam Wall 0-1, Jimmy

Sutton, 0-1, Rory Higgins 0-1, Jack Walsh 0-1. ALL Ireland Inter Schools Showjumping Championship

INT ERSCHOOLS EQUESTRIAN EVENT Tomhaggard, November 9th 2014 Link to Article from the Irish Field http://www.theirishfield.ie/three-wins-on-the-trot-for-good-co unsel-boys-169172/ Good Counsel College hosted a leg of the All Ireland Inter Schools showjumping championships on Sunday last in the Wexford Equestrian Centre, Tomhaggard. A total of 47 teams and over 180 individual riders competed in a range of events including Novice, Primary School and Open teams. The huge turnout for the event was, no doubt, in large part due to it also being a fundraiser for past pupil Darryl Murphy who represented the school in showjumping and hunter trials on many occasions. Darryl, an apprentice jockey, is recovering

from illness and it was a great pleasure to have him and his family present on Sunday when he presented prizes to the winning teams and riders. Indeed, Darryl s younger brother Cian rode on one of the Good Counsel teams while his sister, Paula, was part of the Holy Faith team which came very close to landing the main event, the J.Ryan Haulage Perpetual Trophy for Open teams. After a jump off involving 14 teams, and hugely exciting action, the trophy was lifted by the host school represented by Noel Dunne, Oisin Aylward, Ruairi Aylward and Jack Ryan. Also representing Good Counsel were Jack Kehoe, Aidan Byrne, Eoin Byrne, Jack Dalton, Jim Redmond, Daniel Holden, Robbie Walsh and Cian Murphy. We congratulate all of them and thank them for representing us with such distinction. We must also thank the parents who put such an enormous amount of time and effort into organising what was a tremendously well run show. Their work in securing sponsors, who we are also very grateful to, in getting personnel to help out on the day and indeed their own efforts on the day ensured the success of the event. We must also thank Wexford Equestrian Centre, their staff and all who supported the day, especially all the schools who entered teams. Finally, we take this opportunity to wish Darryl a speedy recovery.