New York boss hoping for Lory Meagher Cup invitation

New York's assimilation into the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship structures took a step forward when it was confirmed that the American side would be competing in the 2023 Connacht Hurling League.

That means a visit to the University of Galway's Connacht GAA Air Dome in January for Richie Harnett’s side, but crucially it will be a soft launch for what he hopes will be an entry pass to the Lory Meagher Cup in the very near future.

Hartnett will lead the side in January’s competition, one that will also feature Leitrim, Mayo, Roscommon, Sligo, a Galway development side and Longford.

It will be the Leinster side who they face in the preliminary round on 2 January and Hartnett hopes that they’ll get to meet some of the other sides involved in a more competitive environment down the line.

"The Lory Meagher is the competition we want to get into," he told RTÉ Sport.

"We’ve put committees together and we tried to get the ball rolling on it [in the past]. It was a Derry man Micky Quigg who was the hurling development officer at that stage, we submitted plans to Croke Park and obviously Covid hit and delayed the whole process.

"We sat and met with Galway hurling development officials this year, Damian Coleman and Cathal Cregg were over and we met with them and we got the ball rolling on it again.

"They had mentioned that the Connacht League would be a great way to dip our toes back into the action in Ireland. We jumped at the chance.

"There have been an awful lot of guys pushing for New York to be involved in these competitions. The footballers have been involved in the Connacht Championship for a long time, from 2002 a team has started coming out every year to play New York. Last year New York got back to Ireland to play in the