COOLEY Kickhams club has organised their Fr Kevin Connolly Cup Tournament for this coming weekend and a number of teams with the name Kickhams have been invited to take part.

There are at least eight teams with the name Kickhams in existence in the country at the moment and four of these, Cooley Kickhams, Knockavilla/ Donaskeigh Kickhams, Kickhams Creggan, and CJ Kickhams, Mullinahone, will be in the peninsula at the weekend. They will be joined by the Fingallians Club from Dublin.

The revised draw is as follows; a preliminary round match takes place on Saturday morning between Cooley and Fingallians at 11am. The winners play CJ Kickhams, Ballinahone, in the afternoon semi-final at 2.30pm while Knocknavilla/ Donaskeigh Kickhams play Creggan in the second semi-final at 12.45pm.

There will be a meal for all the teams in the function room at 6pm followed by a presentation by Cooley Kickhams to all the participating clubs and a social evening with music by Poitin.

On Sunday morning all sides will attend the by now very popular 'breakfast mornings' in the complex.

This will be followed by the tournament final at 1.30pm and the presentation of the Fr Connolly Cup.

The Fr Connolly cup was presented to the Cooley Kickhams Club by the Connolly family in memory of Fr Kevin Connolly who was a former Kickham's player.

Indeed he lined out for Cooley in the county final of 1944 and in 1943 won a Leinster title with Louth when they defeated Laois in the Leinster final.

In 1943 Cooley Kickhams reached the county final, but had to line out without Kevin Connolly and Mick Hardy who by that time had returned to college as it was played on October 24th.

However when Kevin Connolly became a priest it was reported that he continued to play for both club and county under an alias as at that time a man of the cloth was not allowed to play the game.

He was also renowned as the fastest man to have played football in Croke Park.

The cup itself has been hand crafted in silver and therefore must remain with the Cooley club for safekeeping as it is stored in a bank vault.