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Roscrea captain Dan Lavelle leads the team huddle before their Leinster Schools Junior League Final Replay against CBS Monkstown. INPHO/James Crombie
Early Doors

The Morning Score: Thursday

The apprentice takes on the GAA master, another Cat bites the dust and all the El Clasico action.

1. #SIX NATIONS Declan Kidney yesterday named his 30-man extended squad for the upcoming Six Nations championship. And there wasn’t too many surprises.

Tomás O’Leary and Luke Fitzgerald are included in the Irish Wolfhounds squad and Leo Cullen is named in the senior panel, despite earlier reports that he would go under the knife in Sweden in the coming days to resolve an achilles issue.

“The Wolfhounds game gives myself and the other coaches one final chance to give games to players to see possible options before we settle on our match day 22 for the opening game,” Kidney said at the announcement.

2. #APPRENTICE Almost 7,000 people turned up to see Peter Canavan’s Fermanagh take on his native county Tyrone and former boss Mickey Harte in the Dr McKenna Cup at Healy Park last night.

Fermanagh battled back from nine points down but ultimately lost out by three points, 0-13 to 1-7. With the way other results went last night however, the two sides will meet again on Sunday after Derry and Down face off in the other semi-final.

3. #CATS Kilkenny boss Brian Cody will now have to plan without goalkeeper PJ Ryan, after the seven-time All-Ireland winner announced his retirement from intercounty hurling last night.

The news comes days after star forward Eddie Brennan made the same decision.

4. #LOILIVE Shamrock Rovers yesterday held a press briefing with new manager Stephen Kenny at Tallaght. Conor Powell showed impressive timing by signing on the dotted line with the Hoops yesterday, just in time for the media attention.

5. #EL CLASICO It’s advantage Barcelona. Pep Guardiola’s side won the first SuperClasico of 2012 as they travelled to the Santiago Bernabeu last night.

Cristiano Ronaldo put the home side one-up with a superb strike before Carles Puyol equalised with a header and Eric Abidal hit a winner for Barca.

Here’s how it unfolded.

6 . #AUSSIE OPEN Despite some unforced errors, defending champion Novak Djokovic eased into the third round of the Australian Open with a 6-3 6-2 6-1 win over Colombian Santiago Giraldo earlier.

More importantly, Marcos Baghdatis completely freaked out yesterday.

YouTube Credit: AwaRone

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