EC CLUB, BRUSSELS

FEBRUARY 2000 NEWSLETTER

The EC Gaelic Club was honoured to host a visit to Brussels this past weekend by two members of the 1996 and 1999 Meath All-Ireland winning teams, Tommy Dowd & Enda McManus, their wives Geraldine Dowd & Marie McManus and the No 1 Trophy in Gaelic football currently in Meath's possession, the Sam Maguire Cup.

We are grateful to all four for:-

taking the time and trouble to come here to help us have a very successful weekend promoting Gaelic football at all levels in Brussels and Europe; and

at the same time, prove to be fine Ambassadors for their County and for Gaelic football in general.

We also want to thank Meath GAA County Chairman Fintan Ginnity and Team Manager Sean Boylan for the parts they too played in facilitating this visit.

Thanks to sponsors

The weekend was made possible by the generous sponsorship of the following:-

former Club stalwart (and Meath man & fan) Pat O'Reilly who, though now returned to Ireland, sponsored all travel costs for the visitors;

the Leuven Institute for Ireland in Europe;

the Thomas Stapleton Bar in Leuven;

the Wild Geese Bar in Brussels;

the James Joyce Bar in Brussels;

Aer Lingus' Brussels Office which organised reduced fares & VIP treatment for the visitors;

the Kenlis Irish Shop in Brussels; and

Staunton's InterSport Ltd in Ireland.

While much of the advance preparations were done by Valerie Boland, Liam Breslin, John Ludden and Cathal Lynch, during the weekend itself we simply could not have managed without the help of the following:-

Maureen O'Hare of the Leuven Institute for Ireland in Europe;

Heidi, Raymond, Paula and Didier who put the FC Irlande Clubhouse facilities and a pitch at the disposal of our under-age footballers at midday on Saturday and also prepared hot meals for the kids afterwards;

Aideen Scott who organised parents and kids for these hot meals;

Billy Byrne, Liam Durack, Mick Nevin and Gerry Smyth who were out early on Saturday morning to help set things up and who also helped Tommy and Enda make a success of the subsequent coaching session;

Jackie and Dave in the British School of Brussels who excelled themselves by making sure that we had not just a pitch, but also a pitch-side kitchen/restaurant room, available to us for the adults' game on Sunday;

Paddy Corr who made badly needed catering equipment available to us for use in the BSB on Sunday;

Eileen Ludden and Alma Smyth who "fed the masses" at the BSB on Sunday; and

from the ranks of our visitors for the weekend, Ann Donnelly from Paris, Ronan Carroll from Luxembourg, Tommy Briody from Amsterdam and Joe Kavanagh from The Hague who between them made our job easier in terms of co-ordinating the participation of the 40-odd visitors from some of the other European GAA Clubs.

First stop of the weekend was with Fr John Kealy OFM (see photo, Tommy on his right, Enda on his left and The Sam firmly in his grasp !) who hosted the visitors in the Irish College on Friday evening (despite the personal heartbreak these fellas helped cause him when Meath beat his native Mayo by a point in the controversial All-Ireland Final replay of 1996 !).

Fr John brought the visitors on a tour of the College and gave them a full run-down on its historic connections with both Ireland and the Catholic University of Leuven down the centuries - too numerous to list here but the highlights were:-

how The Sam is only the latest in a long line of distinguished visitors there, stretching right back to the O'Neill & O'Donnell Clans hundreds of years ago, some members of which are actually buried in the College's Church;

the story of the writing of the original Annals Of The Four Masters in the College (the Annals first standardised the Irish language in written form, it previously existed only in the oral tradition); and

bringing us right up to the current times on the extensive 1980s refurbishment carried out by successive teams of Irish ANCo trainees.

Fr John then brought all and sundry around the corner to the Institute where Director Malachy Vallely welcomed the visitors (see photo) and gave them an outline of the Ireland-linked educational activities of the Institute, since they commenced their work there following the 1980s renovations to the Irish College as a whole. Malachy also brought the lads fully up to date on the state of hurling in his native Antrim (for whom he once played …).

We then moved upstairs where Belfast girl Maureen O'Hare (and team) had organised food for the visitors - and where the stars and silverware took a resident group of work-experience students from Galway RTC completely by surprise and gave one of them, Catherine McMahon from Kilcormac, Co Offaly an additional guest or two to remember from her 21^st birthday celebrations which were then just warming up …

The final stop on Friday night was the TS Bar. Our thanks to Ken Murphy of the TS for his help in setting this up.

And no, the Bar's name has nothing whatsoever to do with a recent Irish soccer international ! Tipperary native Thomas Stapleton (born 1622, died 1694) was educated in the Irish College and later went on to become Rector Magnificus (ie. Head) of the neighbouring Catholic University of Leuven from 1661 to 1681.

The Irish contingent in Leuven turned out in force to welcome The Sam to their local, with Blues Music laid on to boot (probably a very appropriate choice for the Dubs fans in the Bar looking on with envy at these Meath lads and their silverware !). The only other event of note was a failed attempt to press-gang Tommy up to sing a few songs for the troops (at Geraldine's behest it has to be added …!).

By the way Ken (a Kerryman from Tarbert) did wax lyrical about how The Kingdom was so used to handling this bit of silverware etc. Not so Ken …well technically at least. The current Cup is actually the "Son of Sam", the original was - to use a current topical phrase - decommissioned after the 1998 All-Ireland and retired to its current pasture in the GAA Museum in Croke Park, therefore The Kingdom has only got its mitts on the Son of Sam once, in 1997.

Here, we were really lucky to get the first sunny Saturday since back around the time the O'Neills, O'Donnells and Stapletons were in these parts ... well, it seems like that sometimes !

Tommy and Enda put approximately thirty Brussels Under-age footballers through their paces at the pitch in Woluwe kindly provided by FC Irlande and Tommy also refereed a match the youngsters played amongst themselves.

We were fortunate indeed to have two of the Meath players who happened to have lots of experience coaching kids, particularly Enda who spent a year in the early 1990s as a full-time GAA coach working with kids in Schools all over Co Meath.

Later in the day, Enda commented that neither Tommy nor he had been too sure coming over what to expect from the kids, whether they'd have to start at a "This is a football …" level or what. However, they'd been very surprised to discover that all the kids had a good grasp of the basics and they were accordingly able to quickly pitch their coaching session at more advanced skills of passing, catching, kicking points and so on. They were also impressed to learn that, while most of these kids were born here and never played Gaelic football until our St Patrick's Day outing in March 1999, so much progress had been made before the Winter stop at the end of October 1999.

As it turned out, Saturday morning was far from an event only for the kids who togged out. Parents, older and younger brothers and sisters and others got in on the act and the two lads - and The Sam of course - patiently and repeatedly posed for photos which will adorn many Brussels family albums for some time to come. In addition, numerous Belgians from the KV Woluwe Club that shares the grounds with FC Irlande watched the coaching and match and declared themselves very interested in the sport (something we hope to follow through on in the months ahead).

A few photos of the under-age coaching - including a group picture - are attached, Tommy's the one whose tracksuit has white shoulders and Enda's the blue …

The main social event of the weekend was dinner in the WG Bar which is the main sponsor of the EC Club's Gaelic football and other sporting activities in Brussels. A special word of thanks goes to Cian MacGearailt (another Kerryman, from Dingle this time) and his team, not just for the high quality of the food and service to the seventy or so diners present, but also for his patience and forbearance as the numbers we were supposed to have notified to him several days in advance were still fluctuating wildly with only 24 hours to go ! ! !

The diners included large numbers of GAA Club members from Amsterdam, Luxembourg, Paris and The Hague who, as fellow members of the European GAA Board, came here to support the Brussels GAA weekend - and to get a good look at The Sam. There were also a few (short) speeches by:-

Brussels GAA's Euro Board delegate John Ludden who welcomed all attending whether from Brussels, Ireland or elsewhere;

Euro Board Chairman Mark Scanlan from Paris who gave an update on the continuing integration of the Euro Clubs into the wider GAA family;

Brussels GAA's Cathal Lynch who publicly acknowledged the major contribution to the success of the weekend made by all of the sponsors listed at the start of this Newsletter; and

Tommy Dowd who responded on behalf of the four guests of honour.

Those of us trying in recent times to get the GAA going again in Brussels were delighted to have Co Down's Gerry MacPoilin present at this function (see photo) because he is one of those who started the playing of Gaelic football here in the 1970s. Indeed, other links with former 1970s and 1980s Brussels GAA players were also evident through second-generation participation in the under-age GAA coaching of the same old names like Breslin, Durack, Ludden, McGovern, Nevin, Smyth and so on …

This was the final stop on Saturday night. Proprietor Brian O'Donnell (any connection with the Leuven O'Donnells, Brian ?) warmly welcomed everyone. Again, our thanks to Brian for his assistance and sponsorship and to all his customers who chipped in to our successful raffle on the premises.

Brian did of course remind all and sundry that this was the second visit of the current version of The Sam to Brussels. In fact, he himself had arranged the first visit through connections in his native Donegal (wait, maybe he really is connected to the Clan after all !) who brought it across after Donegal's first ever All-Ireland title win in 1992. Finally, Tommy's singing exploits in the JJ Bar convinced us that he mightn't actually have been an unwilling victim after all in the TS Bar in Leuven the previous night ! ! !

The BSB was the venue for a Brussels -versus- the Rest of Europe adults' match shortly after midday on Sunday. The amalgamation of footballers from the other four Euro cities proved far too strong for the home side and won well by double scores 2--10 to 1--5. A photo of the Brussels side (missing a couple of - very - late arrivals) is attached:-

Back row l-r, Liam Breslin (Westmeath) Mick Nevin (falling over himself … like his native Roscommon!), Valerie Boland (Meath), Adrian McDonagh (Mayo/Leitrim/Cork, he's lived everywhere !), Chris Hutchins (England), Cathal Lynch (Leitrim), Liam Keys (Kilkenny), Kevin Hemmerijckx (Belgium), Derek Hobbs (Dublin), Enda McManus (Meath), Jim Kenny (Glasgow), Tommy Dowd (Meath) & Gerry MacPoilin (Down); and

Front Row l-r, John Ludden (Galway), Diarmuid O'Leary (Tipperary), Leo Toole (Meath & Captain), Conor Leeson (Dublin), Sam Maguire (currently Meath) and Paul Staunton (Cavan).

Again, Tommy refereed the match and his only comment afterwards was on the large amount of "advice" he received on how to properly implement the rules from Brussels GAA's Paul Staunton who hails from just the other side of the Meath border in Co Cavan. Tommy wasn't overly surprised to learn that Paul already holds the unique distinction of receiving what was probably the first ever flash of the GAA version of the yellow card on the Continent of Europe during the Brussels Tournament in July 1999 (from Dublin ref Gay McCabe who subsequently went Down Under to referee in

/…

the October 1999 Ireland-Australia Compromise Rules matches, doubtless a gentle stroll for Gay after the rough and tumble of the Brussels Tournament and tangling with Paul !).

Unfortunately, it wasn't possible for Tommy, Geraldine, Enda & Marie to wait for the after-match get-together as they simply HAD to make the afternoon flight back home at all costs to get both themselves and The Sam back to a major Meath GAA function in Navan that night which included the presentation of the All-Ireland medals to the entire 1999 Meath team and panel. Any screw-ups on the travel front resulting in the absence of this party and silverware from the Navan gig would NOT have gone down well with The Royals back home - indeed yet another reason to thank them for coming here on the weekend that was in it ...

The after-match food and get-together, run with great efficiency by Eileen & Alma, was very pleasant for locals and other Euro visitors alike and set the latter up for their journeys back home.

As for the Brussels kids, they couldn't get enough of a good thing, so off they went again with another match between the large numbers of them who had come out to see the earlier adults' match.

NB … AFTERWARDS, ORGANISERS & PARENTS AGREED THAT THE REGULAR KIDS GAA WOULD RESUME IN THE BSB AT 2.00pm ON SUNDAY 20 FEBRUARY AND CONTINUE EVERY SECOND SUNDAY THEREAFTER …

Our primary focus now is 19 March 2000 in the EU Sports Centre in Overijse when we will play an adults' match against the visiting Monaleen GAA Club from Limerick and also hope to have an opposing team lined up to take on our under-age players.

In addition, another spin off from this past year's resumption of Gaelic football in Brussels is the probability of ladies' GAA starting up here for the first time (ladies' GAA has been one of the fastest growing girls' sport in Ireland in the past decade or so). Patricia Hickey, who works in the Irish Embassy and previously played soccer here with the now lapsed Irish ladies team, now plays with another team called Willebroek near Antwerp. To her surprise, large numbers of her team-mates and opponents alike in the Flanders region North of Brussels knew all about Gaelic football long before she arrived. The source was an Irishman called Bill Hunter from Drumcondra who came to Belgium in 1944 during the War and stayed on (ie. he long predated all of us in the Irish "EU generations") and was very active for many years in sports circles around Mechelen, North East of Brussels. Unfortunately, Bill passed away recently but, while still alive, tried to maintain his Irish connections and a particular highlight late in his life was meeting Ireland's President Mary McAleese when she came here to open the Peace Park in Messines in 1998.

Anyway, Patricia brought her Willebroek team on a visit to Ireland in 1998 taking in a match in Croke Park where Kildare defeated Dublin (for once - maybe the Lilly Whites should have invited these Flemish lassies back for luck for the 1998 Final !). The bottom line of all of this is that Patricia and these Flemish girls now want to try playing Gaelic football for themselves at our St Patrick's Day outing in Overijse and we're happy to oblige ...