Richard "Richie" Bennis (born 1945) is an Irish retired hurler who played as a centre-forward for the Limerick senior team.
[1] Born in Patrickswell, County Limerick, Bennis first played competitive hurling during his schooling at CBS Sexton Street.
He arrived on the inter-county scene at the age of seventeen when he first linked up with the Limerick minor team before later joining the under-21 side.
As a member of the Munster inter-provincial team on several occasions Bennis won one Railway Cup medal as a non-playing substitute.
At club level he has been involved in the management of Camogue Rovers and Patrickswell before taking charge of the Limerick senior team.
The overall craft and experience of Patrickswell, plus some shrewd tactical switches by their mentors, brought a late flurry of scores which finally sounded the death knell for Bruree, as Bennis collected a seventh championship medal following a 0–17 to 0–15 victory.
A narrow 3–12 to 3–11 defeat of old rivals Tipperary, when Bennis scoring a last-second free to win the game, gave him a National Hurling League medal.
[7][8] On 2 September 1973 Limerick faced Kilkenny in the subsequent All-Ireland decider, however, the reigning champions had a depleted team due to a combination of injuries and emigration.
In spite of this, the game hung in the balance for the first-half, however, eight minutes after the restart Mossie Dowling got a vital goal for Limerick.
Limerick stormed to a five-point lead in the first eleven minutes, however, a converted penalty by Eddie Keher, supplemented by further goals from Mick Brennan and Pat Delaney gave Kilkenny a 3–19 to 1–13 victory.
In June 2006 Bennis was included as part of a four-man interim management team that was appointed in Limerick following Joe McKenna's resignation after a seventeen-point defeat to Clare.
[12] In his first full season in charge, Bennis's Limerick enjoyed a remarkable championship campaign and qualified for the All-Ireland decider against Kilkenny on 2 September 2007.
The Cats got off to a flying start with Eddie Brennan and Henry Shefflin scoring two goals within the first ten minutes to set the tone.
In a subsequent interview with the Limerick Leader, Bennis criticized the social habits of a group of players whom he says "broke their hearts in training and then went drinking".