St. Gerald’s College, captured its first ever All-Ireland Colleges Senior B football crown at Breffni Park, Cavan, last Sunday. St. Gerald’s, defeated in the 1998 Senior A final at Croke Park, defeated the Lurgan opposition by 1-12 to 1-10. Extra time was needed to finalise the result as the sides were level when the referee blew the whistle after one minute of extra time. St. Geralds did the business!

Scorers:
St. Gerald’s: Richard O’Boyle 0-6, Sean McHale 1-1, Eamon Tiernan 0-3, Neil Lydon and Tommy Canavan 0-1 each.
St. Michael’s: R. Henderson 1-5, Conor Kavanagh 0-2, D. McAlernon, D. Lavery and K. Lavery 0-1 each.
St. Gerald’s: Richard Byrne; John Conlon, Joe Malone, Alan Joyce; Alan Feeney, Ronan Burke (capt), Sean Ryder; Eamon Tiernan, Tommy Canavan; John Gerard Stenson, Neil Lydon, Colm Gavin; Richard O’Boyle, Brian King, Sean McHale. Subs used: Barry Moran, Kevin McGuinness, Leigh Cresham and Seamus O’Shea.
St. Michael’s: S. Devlin; M. McConville, S. Branagan, K. Nash; M. Mccluskey, I. Lavery, N. Lennon; A. McKeown, D. McAlernon; C. Kavanagh, S. Marshall, D. Lavery; C. Lavery, R. Henderson, K. Totton. Subs used: K. Kenny and J. Toal.
Referee: P. Finnegan (Louth).

Loftus at Large discusses teabags, birds nesting at the top of the Reek, the quality of life and then goes on to analyse the war in Iraq. He does this in a manner that would have him ostracised or in jail if he lived in that great democracy the US of A (as he calls it). Throwaway tongue in cheek comments - sure isn’t it great that only 5000 people were killed and - they will plant weapons of mass destruction if they don’t find any. He reckons that the war is far from over for the Iraqis and if they object to US occupation their incivility will provide convenient post hoc justification for going to war in the first place. His final line says it all though – under the heading SARS he writes: "If you ask me it was Saddam that started this SARS disease too." Real germ warfare?

Achill can be self-sufficient in renewable energy by 2020
A study proposes that Achill Island can be self-sufficient using only renewable energy sources. Current energy bills for the island total one million euros annually but savings of 300,000 could easily be made. The Mayo Energy Agency study proposes major improvements in insulation and energy conservation. Switching from solid fuel and oil fired heating to wind/tide power and the use of solar panels and the geothermal pumps for water and space heating will result in huge reductions in green house gas emissions and financial savings for the island’s inhabitants. The island’s electricity grid is below spec, however, but a major upgrade now in progress will be completed by next year.