All-Ireland ladies football champions Cork are owed a substantial amount of money by their troubled sponsors Smart Telecom, it has emerged. A cheque sent by the telecommunications firm bounced recently and Cork do not know if they will receive a promised bonus payment of EUR5,000 for retaining the Brendan Martin Cup last weekend. It's understood that the Rebels are owed a substantial five-figure sum. Under the terms of the sponsorship agreement, a first payment was due last February, but no money was received until the county board received a cheque from Smart on August 8. However, payment was later stopped on the cheque. "That did ring alarm bells," said Cork ladies football board treasurer Mary Power. "I got it reissued after a lot of begging and pleading, but it took about three weeks." Power went on to say that the Cork board would be "in dire straits" if their sponsors didn't pay up. "It might not be a lot to some people but it is a huge amount of money for us. It costs about EUR100,000 to run all our teams for the year, and winning the All-Ireland obviously makes it more expensive." Smart Telecom has been in financial difficulty recently and over 55,000 subscribers to its telephone service were cut off for a few days earlier this week. Tweet

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