Members of the very successful Under-16 Carrick Rovers soccer team are making a trip to Carrickmacross’s twin town, Carhaix, on the Bank Holiday week-end to play for the Coupe de Jumélage. This visit is an element of the very successful twinning initiative between Carrickmacross and Carhaix in Brittany. The team and coaches leave Carrickmacross on Thursday morning and will return on Monday afternoon.
During their time in Carhaix the footballers will visit the facilities of the French premier league team, F.C. Lorient , and will benefit from a coaching session at their brand-new training-centre. The centre piece of the visit will be the contest for the Coupe de Jumélage, or the Twinning Cup, which will be played for on Saturday afternoon. Carrick Rovers are the current holders of the trophy, having won it three years ago in Carrickmacross. The team will want to retain the trophy and a very competitive game is anticipated. This encounter will act as a curtain-raiser for the league game between F.C. Carhaix and Pont-L’Abbé. The players will spend the week-end in the homes of the Carhaix football players and will get a chance to host these footballers during the return visit in 2016.
The Carrickmacross- Carhaix Twinning Association will celebrate twenty years of successful town twinning in 2016 and a number of events are being planned in both places to mark this milestone. These will include a visit by members of Ceoltóirí Drumlin to Carhaix at Easter followed by a return visit by the soccer players later in the year. The President of the Town Twinning Association, Sean Egan, will travel with the Carrick Rovers group at Hallowe’en to finalise plans for 2016.
Further details will be announced at the Launch Night which has been fixed for Wednesday, 25th November in the Shirley Arms Hotel. The event will commence at 8.00 p.m. and all who have been involved in twinning activities since the beginning are invited to attend. The Association are grateful to Monaghan County Council and the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht for the funding provided.
