IRISH TEAMS NAMED FOR FRENCH AND DANISH NATIONS’ CUPS

THE Irish teams for the five-star French and the three-star Danish Nations’ Cup have been announced within the last hour (Thursday).

Show Jumping Team manager Robert Splaine at La Baule in France declared his team in jumping order as:

Denis Lynch/All Star
Cameron Hanley/Antello Z
Cian O’Connor/Quidam’s Cherie
Billy Twomey/Diaghilev. 

Splaine said: “This is a very important contest, as Ireland has chosen La Baule as one of its points-scoring efforts in the 2014 Furusiyya Division One series. For our team I’ve chosen well-seasoned campaigners who have track records of producing on the big occasion, and I hope tomorrow will be one of those days.

“The competition here is extremely strong – we have the Swiss team who won two weeks ago at Lummen Nations’ Cup in Belgium, and the French, who placed second at Lummen, will be competing on home ground, with national pride at stake.”

Ireland has been drawn to jump fourth of eight nations taking part at La Baule.

At Odense in Denmark, Irish Chef d’Equipe James Tarrant has chosen the following team from the squad selected by Splaine, and the jumping order will be:

Thomas Ryan/Caribo
Michael Duffy/Murchu
Capt. Michael Kelly/Annestown (ISH)
Niall Talbot/Nicos de la Cense

Ireland is drawn 12th of 13 teams to jump at the Furusiyya Division Two series competition at Odense. Second-man-in, 17 year-old Michael Duffy from Mayo, will be making his senior Nations’ Cup debut at the event.

**Live video coverage from La Baule Nations’ Cup will be available at www.feitv.org from 12.40pm Irish time, and from Odense at 14.55 Irish time**