RUGBY NEWS ROUND-UP:AS PART of the make-over of the RBS Six Nations tournament, next season's event will include a Friday night kick-off, while two of Ireland's matches will be played under floodlights in Croke Park.
That means evening showdowns against England and France, arguably Ireland's hardest games. France come first and England third in next year's scheduling.
Fans, however, might hope there will be something at stake in Ireland's last match of the competition at the Millennium Stadium, where they meet Wales on March 21st owhat is being called Super Sunday. There are three live games that day that may prove key to deciding the Championship.
With a view to bringing the competition to the widest audience, and following the success of the Rugby World Cup in France last year, which held games on Friday nights, the organisers have decided to follow suit and have scheduled Grand Slam champions Wales to play their away game against France in Stade de France on Friday, February 28th, at 9pm (8pm Irish time).
Ireland have four late starts, and only their 2.30 kick-off match against Italy in Rome on St Valentine's weekend on Sunday, February 15th, starts before 5pm.
Ireland welcome France in Croke park at 5.30pm on February 7th, play Italy in the afternoon the following Sunday, then have a week free before meeting England at 5.30 in Croke Park on Saturday, February 28th.
Ireland then face Scotland in Murrayfield in a 5pm kick-off on March 14th, before their final game, in Wales, again at 5.30pm.
"The 2008 RBS Six Nations Championships concluded recently on yet another high note," said Six Nations chairman Jaques Laurans. "The atmosphere in Cardiff was electric and I am convinced that next year's championship will be equally dramatic. Once again the championship brought in huge TV audiences in all its countries and we are looking forward to even more exciting matches and unpredictable results."
Ireland's international schedule between now and the 2009 Six Nations comprises five matches. The team travels to the Southern Hemisphere this summer to play New Zealand in Wellington on June 7th, followed by Australia a week later in Melbourne on June 14th.
In the autumn, Ireland play three home matches, against Canada on November 8th, against the All Blacks on November 15th and finally Argentina on November 22nd.
Elsewhere, the Munster Supporters Club (MRSC) have ruled out any protest action regarding the allocation of tickets for Thomond Park.
The MRSC's number of tickets for the redeveloped Thomond Park increased by just 1,000, from 2,000, whereas they were hoping the Munster Branch would increase the allocation to a figure closer to 10,000.
Yesterday MRSC press officer Glenn Flanagan acknowledged that they had to accept the reasoning of the branch and said that there is no other avenue open to them. The suggestion of a protest was dismissed outright. "No, we wouldn't organise anything like that," he said. "We wouldn't condone anything like that. This is all about the team and the match now in two weeks."
The Munster Branch released a breakdown of the ticket allocations, which showed that 12,000 season tickets will be sold through the Munster clubs and the MRSC for Thomond Park, incorporating the Magners League and Heineken Cup. They added that over 67 per cent of the tickets were accounted for by the Munster clubs, schools, MRSC and 10-year ticket holders.
Thomond Park's new capacity will be approximately 25,000.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)