Dublin City University decided against travelling to an O'Byrne Cup Shield clash with Athlone IT because a number of their players were pressurised into lining out for their county rather than representing the college. A number of colleges now participate in the early season provincial competitions and part of the rules are that they must have first call on all players who are also involved in county action. However, in this season's O'Byrne Cup a number of college players lined out with their counties and DCU decided to withdraw from the competition in protest. "We feel that the recent pressures that were placed directly on some players to play for their county instead of their college were unfair to those involved," said DCU's Declan Brennan. Tweet

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