The Branagan, Killane and Willie Brennan Cup competitions have started.

Elm Mount got off to an excellent start in the Branagan, with a 3½-2½ win away to the Armstrong cup winners, Gonzaga, in the first match. The scores on each board were:-
Gavin Melaugh 0-1 Sam Collins
Shane Melaugh ½-½ Henry Li
Paul O’Neill 1-0 Killian Delaney
Terry Creighton 0-1 Gordon Freeman
Alex Goss 1-0 Eoghan Casey
Andrew Peters 1-0 Andy Keenan

Elm Mount will be putting forward a motion to the LCU agm that match points should be used for the group stages of the cup competitions (eg a team gets 1 point for winning a match and ½ point for drawing). The advantage are:-
- a team which wins all its matches will always qualify for the next round
- it reduces the impact of a club which is no longer in contention putting out a very weak team. When groups are small, this can have a big impact.