I had the honour to coach the Irish RIBSA Junior team to win the 2016 Celtic Challenge in the Terry Griffiths Matchroom in Llanelli, Wales on Saturday the 25th of June. The team put on a fantastic display of Snooker to win with a session to spare over a talented young Welsh team.
This annual event features the best Irish and Welsh under 14 and Under 16 players. The six players on each team play two frames against each other over six sessions of play.
The Irish team won the first five session in style but the Welsh fought back to win the final session but it was all too late. Gordon Pantall from the Welsh Billiards & Snooker Association presented the Irish team captain and 147Academy player Ross Bulman from Youghal CYMS with the Perpetual Cup.
Session Scores
Session 1 : Ireland 13 – Wales 11
Session 2 : Ireland 19 – Wales 5
Session 3 : Ireland 15 – Wales 9
Session 4 : Ireland 13 – Wales 11
Session 5 : Ireland 15 – Wales 9
Session 6 : Ireland 10 – Wales 14
Overall Score : Ireland 85 – Wales 59
The U-14 Team Manager was Brendan Cooney from Youghal and U-16 Team manager was James Bateman from Kilkenny. The Team assistant was young Oisin Bateman.
The RIBSA Referees were Ger Murray, Declan Quinn and Don O Donoghue and they all did a superb job on the day. RIBSA Chairman Jim Leacy said he was delighted with the performance from all our juniors. All the hard work done by RIBSA through our National Coach is paying off with two victories in this event in the last three years.
Event Stats
Sean Walsh from Cork won 11 out of his possible 12 frames while his club mate Aaron Hill won 10 out of his possible 12 frames and Sean Devenney from Northwest SC won the overall high break with a superb 68 break. The Irish and Welsh Under 16 teams drew 36 frames each in the event, but the Under 14 Irish team beat their Welsh opponents 49 frames to 23 to give the Irish team overall victory.
WELL DONE TEAM IRELAND !!!!!!!
