On Sun 21 Nov in Amsterdam, with GAA President Joe McDonagh present, a European GAA Board was formed and will be ratified by the GAA Congress in Galway in the Spring. Valerie Boland, John Ludden and Cathal Lynch represented Brux GAA at the meeting. John Ludden was elected as our first member of this Euro Board. A full report of the meeting (including acknowledgement of the success of Under-age Gaelic football in Brussels) is attached, as are subsequent press reports in The Examiner and Irish Times on 22 Nov and in the Sunday Times Irish edition of 28 Nov. Check out the ST article, it looks at the flourishing of the GAA around the world - including a bit on the (now) world famous Naomh Abdullah's GAA Club in Dubai ! ! !

Valerie Boland (e-mail ... [email protected] ), tel 02 295 3799 (w);

John Ludden (e-mail ... [email protected] ), tel 02 767 8047 (h): or

Cathal Lynch (e-mail ... [email protected] ), tel 02 512 3333 (w).

Kevin McGee Dresden

Robert Bushnell Dusseldorf

Larry Hughes Guernsey

Adrian Walsh Lyon

Each person was proposed, seconded and elected unanimously.

A member from Luxembourg said that they would be nominating a representative as soon as their own AGM is held. It was agreed that details of this nominee would be sent to Debbie Massey.

A number of issues were discussed at this time. Questions regarding the transfer of players etc., were raised. It was noted that Rule 87 the Overseas Rule, does provide for deviation from Rule and that an application to deviate would need to be processed through An Coiste Bainistí and Ard-Chomhairle.

Barney Winston introduced the GAA President Joe McDonagh to the meeting and thanked him for his unparalleled commitment to the Units of the Association abroad. He invited the President to address the meeting.

Joe McDonagh thanked the delegates for their attendance at such an historical occasion. He thanked them for taking part in and supporting Gaelic Games. He referred to the fact that Gaelic Games have been played in Europe over many years on and off. He said that he felt that a formal structure would lead to greater development and support for that development from the Association in Ireland.

He went on to say that he envisaged Rule 87 being utilised in the early stages. He also said that the provision of the Strategic Planning module from the Comhairle County Officers Training Programme would provide a strong base from which all of those elected could move forward by planning strategically and realistically for the development of the games in Europe. He said that he was aware of the strong commitment of the incoming Uachtarán to this and other overseas projects.

The President went on to thank Barney Winston and Debbie Massey and members of the International Dimension Workgroup. He said he was looking forward to seeing how the new structure would develop into the new millennium. He thanked all those who took on positions and thanked everybody for their interest and involvement. He committed to working in partnership and co-operation with the European units.

The meeting ended.

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The Examiner 22/11/99 (reporter Cormac Mac Ruairí) European GAA Board a step closer as comittee members are appointed

THE establishment of a European Board of the GAA came one step closer yesterday as representatives of the continental Gaelic clubs met in an Amsterdam hotel to appoint board members to the embryonic committee.

An application by the European Board affiliate to the GAA still has to be accepted by the management in Croke Park before going before the association’s congress in Galway next year for ratification.

The President of the GAA, Joe McDonagh, attended the Amsterdam meeting. He congratulated the European teams for their achievements to date and he wished them a bright future as an integral part of the GAA. He reminded the meeting that shortly after his election 1997 he had visited the Paris Gaels Club and stated that one of the goals of his presidency would be the establishment of a European Board. "Gaelic games play a central role among the Irish community overseas and the European Board will add greatly to the development of the GAA," he said.

His sentiments were echoed by Barney Winston, of the GAA’s International Dimensions Workgroup, who chaired the historic meeting. Mr Winson told the gathering: "we are a big family with new cousins in various places around the world but we will be looking after the flower growing in Europe and tending to it." Dozens of representatives from various European Clubs packed into the hotel conference room to select members to the new board.

The position of chairperson of the European Board went to Mark Scanlon of Paris Gaels and Ann Donnelly, also from Paris, was appointed secretary. Representatives from The Hague, Brussels, Germany, France and Guernsey were also appointed to the board.

On Saturday, in Amsterdam, Paris Gaels clinched the Brendan Maloney Memorial Football Trophy by one goal from The Hague Club. Teams from Guernsey and Luxembourg also took part in the one-day competition, hosted annually by the Dutch team in association with the Irish Club Netherlands.

A report of both the competition and the meeting will be broadcast on the Irish language Spórtiris programme next Thursday at 9.30pm on TG4. The programme will be rebroadcast with English subtitles on RTE´ 1 at noon on Saturday.

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The establishment of a European Board of the GAA came one step closer yesterday as representatives of the continental Gaelic clubs met in Amsterdam to appoint board members to the embryonic committee.

An application by the European board to affiliate to the GAA still has to be accepted by the management in Croke Park before going before the Congress in Galway next year for ratification.

The President of the GAA, Joe McDonagh, attended the Amsterdam meeting while Barney Winston, of the GAA's International Dimensions Workgroup, chaired the historic meeting.

The position for chairperson of the European Board went to Mark Scanlon of Paris Gaels and Ann Donnelly, also from Paris, was appointed secretary.

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'We're the Young Europeans', went the IDA's slogan back in the eighties, putting a new spin on the old emigrant's lament: the young are still pouring out of the country, said the subtext - but at least they're not all navvies now.

Last weekend Joe McDonagh held a sort of a summit in Amsterdam for the GAA's European diaspora, where he met representatives from the latest generation of young Irish Europeans.

And if the first wave of the so-called Ryanair generation was often anxious to distance itself from the old sod - lest its cosmopolitan credentials be compromised - there is a growing sense that this generation has a different take on the experience: comfortable with one foot in the global village - and another in the native village whence they came.

It helps, of course, that it's good to be Irish these days - and if they could make Irish dancing sexy, then even the GAA could eventually come in from the cold.

Which may help to explain why GAA clubs are mushrooming in Europe, not to mention the Far East, alongside the traditional territories in England, the UK and Australia.

And which is why McDonagh was in Amsterdam last weekend. In April '97 he announced his ambitions to see a European board formed - a kind of county board for the continent - and he moved one step closer to that objective on Sunday when a list of officers were appointed to a provisional board.

That board will now put a formal request in writing to the GAA's management committee, seeking affiliation to the association, and ultimate ratification at Congress next year.

The chairman of the European Board is Mark Scanlon, a 28-year-old Clareman who has been based in France since 1993. A corporate broker based in the capital, he plays with Paris Gaels, perhaps the strongest GAA unit on the continent.

"I used to play a lot of hurling back home in Clarecastle and I missed it when I came over here," says Scanlon. "It'd be nice to get games here on a regular basis, maybe a league eventually. But we're looking to take hurling and football forward in Europe, build on what's there already."

There are seven other active GAA groupings on the continent: Luxembourg, Brussels, The Hague, Guernsey, Dusseldorf, Brest and Lyon.

"We've also had inquiries," says Barney Winston, chairman of Croke Park's International Dimension Workgroup, "from Berlin, Munich, Dresden and Madrid."

"Because we haven't a regular league or championship," explains Scanlon, "we depend on each club to run a tournament. We also get games against visiting teams so it works out at about a match a month, which isn't bad."

Paris Gaels beat The Hague in a tournament cup match in Amsterdam last Saturday.

"We've also travelled to Brest, Guernsey, Luxembourg, Brussels and The Hague this season for weekend tournaments." These are normally seven-a-side games, occasionally eleven.

"It's growing and growing," says Winston, "but one has to be quite honest about all of this: this is not county championship standard. But I don't think it has to be. I believe quite honestly they are probably getting more enjoyment out of playing the games than anybody else because they're playing them for the love of playing them."

The social dimension to these tournaments is, by all accounts, outstanding. Monstrous," says Ray Tully, chairman and founder of Guernsey Gaels, "absolutely monstrous". "It's a big social gathering round a sporting event," adds Scanlon.

A county player with Sligo for four years in the late 80s, Tully missed the football when he arrived in Guernsey in 1996. He tried playing with Jersey Gaels (who compete in the London championship) on the neighbouring island but the travelling made it impossible.

"So I decided to set up a club here. I put an advertisement in the paper and lo and behold, 10 or 12 lads turned up. The whole thing blossomed from there."

Guernsey held their tournament on the bank holiday weekend in May - it is set to become a permanent fixture in the calendar. Situated off the coast of Brittany, the Irish expatriate community is small - about 900 in a population of 60,000 - which is why they've pressganged a few Scots and second generation Irish, more used to rugby and soccer, to take up the code.

The travelling to play in other cities is the best part of it, says Tully. "The amount of people who will come from all over Europe to get to these tournaments would amaze you," he says.

Like Scanlon, he senses some sort of identity thing at the heart of it all. "I definitely think so. When you go abroad, Irish people want to assert their identity, and gaelic games are part of that."

For the Bretons who line out with Brest, says Scanlon, playing gaelic football is another way of connecting with their Celtic heritage. "There are a lot of Bretons in Paris, and all over France, and they're very interested in gaelic and hurling."

Another important factor in the upsurge, says Winston, is the televised games during summer. "They're being seen on hundreds of sites throughout Europe, Sunday after Sunday, and I think that is what is really captivating the imagination of an awful lot of people over there, rejuvenating the interest of many expats who would not have had access to anything like this previously."

It is not only a European phenomenon. A hardy bunch of expats are flying the flag in Dubai, where they trade under the rather splendid title, Naomh Abdullah's.

In the Far East, a group of young Irishmen founded Cumann Luthchleas Gael Taipei on New Year's Eve 1995 - or at least said they would. They were true to their word and in May '96 held the first-ever South-East Asia gaelic games festival, in the Philippines capital, Manila.

Now operating as CLG Taiwan, the annual festival has got bigger and bigger each year since.

At the Australasian finals, held in Perth in early October, teams from Australia and New Zealand were joined by Taiwan and, for the first time, a side from Singapore. The Singapore caucus has big plans for development while an embryonic organisation is up and running in Tokyo.

"Founded in April 1997," says the website for Japan GAA, "in response to the initiative of the Irish in Taiwan to promote Gaelic games in Asia, the Japan GAA hopes to create an awareness of Gaelic sports in Japan, and organise frequent GAA events."

And now, all of a sudden, the Cayman Islands are also about to take their place among the nations. "They have a team there," says Winston, "and they actually fly into the United States to play games."

All pioneers, after a fashion, but not the first global exponents of the game of the Gael, not by a long way. In 1747, an Irish Brigade at the Battle of Lafelt near Maastricht played hurling matches among themselves, a letter in the Croke Park Museum confirms this.

In Melbourne, on July 12 1844, a hurling match between the men of Clare and Tipperary took place. It was arranged, writes the hurling historian Seamus J King, "as a counterblast to an Orange procession in the same place to which all good men who hated 'Pope and Popery, brass money and wooden shoes', were expected to give their assistance. The match attracted 500 stalwart Irishmen armed with hurleys, staves and shillelaghs. A contemporary bard described the scene in a ballad.

"And first in the field were the gallant old Tips,

With strength in their arms and smiles on their lips;

While famed Garryowen poured its tribute along,

And Clare's sturdy peasants were thick in the throng."

Indeed. And not a young European among them ...

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