League final fixed for Sunday on a packed weekend for Offaly hurling teams

THE National Hurling League Division 2 final has been fixed for Portlaoise on Sunday, April 2 on what will be a very busy weekend for Offaly hurling teams.

Offaly and Kildare will meet in the Division 2 final at 2.00pm on Sunday with promotion to Division 1 at stake. The sides drew in the group stages a couple of weeks ago. There had been speculation that the final could be played on Thurles on Saturday but giving it a Sunday setting in Portlaoise and leaving Saturday free for underage games made perfect sense – especially as Offaly's bid for a place in the National Football League Division 3 final was ended by Down.

There is a very attractive underage Leinster Championship double bill in O'Connor Park on Saturday. Offaly play Kerry in the Leinster Minor Hurling Championship at 12 noon while the U-20 hurlers enter championship action against Westmeath at 2.00pm.

The U-20 hurlers are in a group with Westmeath, Meath and Antrim. They are away to Meath and will play Antrim in their third game at a Leinster venue. Two will qualify for the preliminary quarter-finals and Offaly will be hot favourites to top the group.

A number of last year's All-Ireland minor finalists will be on the team and even though they are young for U-20, Offaly should have a decent team.

They will be blending in with older players. One of those is Charlie Mitchell who has been playing very well for Offaly senior hurlers. He was outstanding in last Saturday's Division 2 semi-final win over Kerry but he will be focusing on the U-20 hurlers this weekend. With a mounting injury list and a packed schedule of games for seniors and U-20s in the next month, it is very unlikely that Johnny Kelly will ask him to play games on successive days.

After losing to Dublin last Saturday, the minor hurlers must beat Kerry. They are at home to Wexford in their final game a week later and with three qualifying from the group, they can't afford any slip ups here. Kerry were hammered by Wexford on Saturday and while Offaly ended up well beaten by Dublin, 4-18 to 0-19, they did very well to get back into contention during the second half. They should be able to get the result against Kerry and this will almost certainly secure qualification.

Offaly U-20 footballers play their second game against Wicklow in Faithful Fields on Tuesday evening. Very fortunate to draw with Louth last week, Offaly have plenty of improving to do and with a final game at home to Dublin, they really have to beat Wicklow. Cormac Egan could be ready to play again after sitting out the trip to Louth with a broken finger while another forward Chris Kenny could also come into the equation.

Meanwhile the packed schedule of games has resulted in the Offaly GAA County Board postponing one of their major fundraisers of the year, the Grand Canal Walk. A joint fundraising venture between the board and clubs, the decision was taken last weekend to postpone the walk for one month to the bank holiday Monday, May 1. It will give busy board officers more time to push the walk.