Debaters of St. Conleth’s, Unite!
24 February 2023Conlethian debaters have certainly made their mark as individuals. Scroll downwards (and in older Conlethian annals) for the exploits of Daniel Gilligan, Conor White, Kevin Roche, Liam Brophy and other They-People, Masters of the Debating Universe. But it is as equal parts of a dynamic duo, a titanic tandem, a binary barnstormer… that our orators really seem to rock the rostrum. Michael O’Dwyer and Philip MacDonald were a legendary rhetorical team, eventually as Slaughter & May legal eagles, but first as Mace and Cup winning schools debaters. And the reverberations of the one-two punch of Matthew Collins and Christopher Costigan and of Paul O’Dwyer and Conan Quinn are still echoing through debating halls throughout this land… and others. And, now, two more teams have emerged from the hotbed of internecine warfare that is Conlethian in-house debating and they, too, will join the hallowed names mentioned above. Coleman Hegarty & Turlough Dineen and Lochlan Flynn & Finley O’Dea have qualified for the Leinster Schools Senior Debating Championship Semifinals, topping a tab which was filled with the names of the second-best debating schools in Ireland. Also pictured is Leo Nolan, who fought bravely as a lone wolf in the quarterfinals but, alas, like Trotsky, had to exit stage left. The sixth young man pictured below is unknown, but we suspect it is Beria.