Notre Dame's Irish links and what the Aviva Stadium can expect

Three years ago, almost 40,000 US visitors had made arrangements to come to Dublin for the season-opening college football game between Notre Dame's 'Fighting Irish' and Navy at the Aviva Stadium.

The Aer Lingus College Football Classic had been due to take place on 29 August of that year but ultimately never came to pass due to the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic - as did a subsequent attempt to stage another college game here the following year.

However, this Saturday will finally see the two rival teams battling it out by Lansdowne Road and a host of spectators will be crossing to this side of the Atlantic.

It will be the third time that the fixture will have been held in Dublin, the first coming in 1996 at Croke Park before they returned again in 2012 at the Aviva.

But for Irish spectators who weren't at either of those previous occasions or aren't acquainted with Notre Dame nor the rivalry with Navy, what can they expect in and around game day?

RTÉ Sport caught up with Len Clark, who as well as having taught multimedia journalism at Notre Dame, regularly reports on the South Bend, Indiana-based football team's fortunes for Irish Illustrated and has put together an eGuide to Dublin for visiting fans from the US.

"Notre Dame has had a long connection with Ireland. It's a French name. (The university) was founded in 1842 by Father Edward Sorin but what a lot of people don't know is that when he travelled up from southern Indiana, he had seven brothers of the Order of St Joseph with him, some of whom were Irish," Clark explained.

While the university's connection to Ireland might go back to its founding, why the football team adopted the 'Fighting Irish' moniker is a much more contested part of its history and a number of