Early Season Battles

Mark Earley continues An Irish Eye looking an exciting start to the 2014 season . . .

While most teams around Europe are slowly getting back into track work, playing indoors or perhaps holding trials for the long season ahead, three of the four strongest Open Division teams in Ireland are busy preparing for a winner takes all WUCC Qualifier mini-tournament. On the 16th of February Ranelagh (Dublin), Rebel Ultimate (Cork) and Pelt Ultimate (Limerick) are playing each other in Dublin for the chance to go to Lecco. (Jabba opted out despite their 2nd place finish in last year's All-Ireland Championships). The one day event will be a round robin style affair with each team playing two games. (A similar event took place last season for qualification to EUCRs and Ranelagh won, subsequently travelling to Bern for EUCR-SW where they finished 9^th). Speaking of EUC-R, the winner of this tournament will also get the opportunity to represent Ireland at European level next summer, so there are effectively two prizes on offer. Factoring in the costs of a Worlds campaign, it will be interesting to see if the winning club decides to attend both...

Ranelagh at EUCR-S

Mark Earley returns with An Irish Eye looking back at Ranelagh's performance at EUCR-S.

Two weeks ago Ranelagh travelled from Dublin to Bern in Switzerland for EUCR-S hoping to have a crack at a region renowned for its strength. It was only the second time an Irish team had attempted qualification for EUCF and was to prove more difficult than the last attempt (when a Dublin Ultimate team full of pick ups finished 1 spot away from qualifying in 2010 in Nantes). The team was nearly at full strength, but also had a lot of new young players as well the established core.

Day one saw Ranelagh (9) face Italian champions CUSB (3) in the first game of the day. It started well for the Dublin team as they took the lead having started on D and stayed ahead until midway through the first half. Bologna fought back with a couple of breaks of their own and lead for a while until another Ranelagh surge saw them take half 8-7. In the third quarter of the game a combination of increased defensive pressure and some Ranelagh miscues saw Bologna jump out to a 3 point lead which they held onto to see out the game 14-10.

The Grapevine U23 Special

This Saturday special edition of The Grapevine gives you the one stop shop for all the links and pages for the GB and Ireland U23 teams in Toronto.

For general tournament news and results on the official facebook, twitter and website.

NGN are streaming 15 games from the championship, the streaming schedule has not been released but all games on PITCH 3 (Show pitch) are highlighted below on the full schedule (times are BST).

Some more streaming will be shown on iamultimate.com ... here. Keep an eye on that since they can only do what they are allowed to.

Ultiapps have made another schedule which is a bit easier to read see full version here. Also includes a great score reporter.

Great Britain  

Open 

Division info:
Two pools of 7 and 8 played until Thursday then crossovers for 4th and 5th in pools then QF/SF/F next Friday to Sunday. 
Squad twitter.

Schedule (Ultiapps): Sunday 21st

Canada 10pm (Show pitch) [14-17 L]

Monday 22nd 

Mexico 2pm [17-2 W]

Tuesday 23rd

France 4pm [17-7 W]

New Zealand 8pm [17-13 W]

Wednesday 24th

Dominican Republic 2pm [13-8 W]

Japan 8pm [12-17 L]

Thursday 25th

Austria 2pm [13-15 L]
Switzerland 8pm (show pitch) [13-10 W]

Friday 26th - Quarter Final
USA 4pm [7-17 L]

5v8 Austria 8pm [17-16 W]

Saturday 27th - 5v6 Placement game
Japan 6pm [17-16 W] - coming back from 13-16 down, finish 5th.

Mixed

Division info: Two pools of 5 and 6 (Pools A and B) played out until Wednesday, then 2 power pools (Pools C and D) consisting of top 3 from each prelim in one and remaining 5 teams in other played on Friday. Leading to QF/SF/F in top 8, bottom 3 round robin (Pool G) played next weekend. 
Squad facebook and twitter.

Schedule (Ultiapps): Monday 22nd

Colombia 5pm [14-11 W]
Australia midnight (Show pitch) [13-17 L]

Tuesday 23rd
Chinese Tapei 6pm [10-9 W]
USA 10pm [3-17 L]

Wednesday 24th
Venezuela 4pm [4-17 L]

Thursday 25th - Lower power pool
Austria 2pm [14-15 L]

Friday 26th
Germany 6pm [13-12 W]

Saturday 27th
5v8 Ireland 2pm [8-15 L] 
7v8 Australia 8pm [12-9 W] - taking 7th and a 4W:5L record is nothing to scoff at!

Women

Division info: One pool of 10 played out until Friday, then straight to SF/placement games on Saturday and final on Sunday.  
Squad twitter.

Schedule (Ultiapps): Monday 22nd
Japan 4pm [6-17 L]
Germany 8pm [13-14 L]

Tuesday 23rd
New Zealand (who they beat in a warm up yesterday) 2pm [17-2 W]
Colombia 8pm [8-16 L]

Wednesday 24th
Mexico 4pm [12-5 W]
Canada 8pm [9-17 L]

Thursday 25th
Australia 6pm [17-10 W]
Austria 10pm [17-11 W]

Friday 26th
USA 2pm (Show pitch) [2-17 L]

Saturday 27th
5v6 Germany 8pm [6-12 L] - finish in 6th and a 4W:6L record. Great work ladies! 

Ireland

Open

Squad facebook. 

Schedule: Monday 22nd
Switzerland 2pm [14-17 L]
Colombia 8pm [10-15 L]

Tuesday 23rd
Germany 4pm [11-16 L]
Australia 8pm [12-17 L]

Wednesday 24th
USA 6pm [4-17 L]
Italy 10pm [9-16 L]

Friday 26th - 9 to 13 bracket
New Zealand 2pm [8-14 L]
TBD 8pm [16-6 W]

Saturday - 13th placement game
Dominican Republic 10pm [12-14 L] - putting these lads in 14th, a fine performance in a division of amazing strength! 

Mixed

Squad facebook.

Schedule: Monday 22nd
Germany 4pm [17-5 W]

Tuesday 23rd
Canada 2pm (Show pitch) [10-15 L]

Wednesday 24th
Austria 6pm [17-4 W]
Japan 10pm [12-17 L]

Thursday 25th - Top power pool
Venezuela 6pm [11-16 L]

Friday 26th
USA 6pm [4-17 L]
Australia 10pm [16-8 W]

Saturday 27th
5v8 GB 2pm [15-8 W]
5v6 Austria 8pm [16-11 W] taking 5th and highest European Mixed team! 

Get behind your team on twitter and facebook! Let's go GB! DP @ tSG.