Peter Moloney and Darragh Kenny through to European Championship individual final as Ireland miss out on Olympic qualification by one place

Two Irish riders have made it through to Sunday’s individual final at the Longines FEI European Championships in Rotterdam (NED) and with two more rounds of jumping to come are just over one fence off the medal places.

Waterford’s Peter Moloney jumped a fantastic clear round with Chianti’s Champion in today’s (Friday) final of the team competition in Rotterdam moving them up to 13th place on a score of 8.75 penalties. Offaly’s Darragh Kenny and Balou Du Reventon are now in 17th on 9.78. Only the top 25 riders have made it through to Sundays two-round final, with Britain’s Ben Maher currently in gold medal position on 0.62, with Jos Verloy (BEL) in silver on 1.68, while Martin Fuchs is in bronze on 3.46.

Rodrigo Pessoa’s Irish team narrowly missed out on taking one of the three Olympic team qualification places that were on offer in Rotterdam, and will now turn their attention to October’s Nations Cup World Final in Barcelona where one final ticket to Tokyo will be up for grabs.

The team final saw Ireland close the gap on the teams above them who were chasing Olympic qualification, overtaking Italy in the process. Cian O’Connor got Ireland off to a brilliant start when jumping clear with PSG Final. Shane Sweetnam had a single fence down with Alejandro, before Peter Moloney delivered a second Irish clear round with Chianti’s Champion. Ireland’s anchor rider Darragh Kenny finished with one fence down with Balou Du Reventon.
Belgium, Britain and France grabbed the three Olympic spots on offer leaving Ireland one spot outside the qualifying places. Belgium are the new European Champions after taking the gold medal in Rotterdam with silver going to Germany while Britain took the bronze.

The first round of Sunday’s individual final starts at 12 noon Irish time, with the second round getting underway at 2.30pm.

The Irish Show Jumping team is sponsored by Devenish & The Underwriting Exchange
Equiline – Official athlete clothing supplier of Team Ireland Equestrian