The Corn Cairdis (Cup of Friendship)

The Corn Cairdis originated during the later years of Ireland’s 50-odd year absence from the Home International series, and provided an opportunity for Irish and English teams in six categories to play competitively against each other.  At the start there were two pools – Open, Ladies and Juniors; and County, Club and Officials.  With the welcome return of Ireland to the Home International competitions in 1998/9, the Open, Ladies and Juniors part of the Corn Cairdis was discontinued, but the event was far too much fun to be abandoned completely, and has become one for County, Club and Officials teams only.  For a while the event was played alongside the Camrose match between the two countries, but with the advent of the new Camrose format in 2005, this is no longer practicable, so it is once again being played separately.

This is the 16th match in the series with the score standing at 9-6 to England.  In the early years the home side won every fixture in the series, but in the next few years, England consistently had the better of the exchanges on both sides of the water.  However Ireland won three in a row from 2004 and narrowly lost in Galway in 2007.

English Teams

County: John & Julie Aspinall, Paul Darby & Steve Dannell, David Newstead & Roger Amey

Club: Mike & Barbara Harnden, Peter & Margaret Smith, Roger Cortis & Robbie Robertson (Sat), Suzanne Gill & Joe Merz (Sun)

Officials: Gerard Faulkner & Peter Stocken, John Carter & Graham Jepson

Irish Teams

County: Mary Finn & Cian Holland, Ger Cummins & Tom McCarthy

Club: Margo & Paddy English, Charlie Higgins & Maurice QUinn

Officials: Michael O'Connor & Seamus Dowling, Gordon Lessells & Desmond Houlihan

Click here for the current results.