Hurling

Orizio

Just a question to the posters here - how is hurling doing, progressing in your area?

I live in east Cork, and naturally enough it seems to be flourishing generally, particurly in areas like Midleton and Carrigtwohill, but I'm more interested in areas like Waterford, Limerick, Dublin (Leinster in general) and Ulster.

Daysha

You can definitely notice a different in the county here since the recent successes that's for sure. Granted I spend most of my time in Dublin these days, but certainly reaching the AI final has opened up hurling to wide range of new supporters. People who wouldn't have even bothered going to a hurling match before they all got caught up in the madness preceeding last September.

Underage is definitely improving too. We've never had the greatest underage structure here and while we still struggle at minor and U21 level, the exploits of De La Salle College and Blackwater have given renewed optimism around the place.

Also there's quite a number of younger players who can break through the senior ranks in the next year or two too, something that you couldn't say about Waterford hurling the past 5/6 years. Players like Adrien Power, the Connors brothers, Philip Mahony and Maurice Shanahan can make a name for themselves in the future.

After all, we don't have the youngest team in the world. Ken McGrath, Tony Browne, Dan Shanahan, Clinton Hennessy are all above 30, and a few more like Mullane, the Prender brothers, Eoin Murphy and Eoin McGrath are in their late 20's. So the next few years will be critical in nurturing the young players to come through the ranks. We've been doing it slowly but surely the past 2 years with Aidan Kearney, Stephen Molumphy, Jamie Nagle and Kevin Moran so it's important to keep that going as much as possible.

But what's probably most pleasing is the improvement of the "lesser" clubs in the county. Ballygunner and Mount Sion always dominated Waterford hurling, and while it's great that another city club, De La Salle, did so well last year, it's particularly pleasing to see the rural clubs do so well without succeeding at the expense of football. Football is generally regarded as more popular in the some Waterford towns and villages but as you can see from the NFL Waterford football is at it's best for quite some time.

FYI, last years county final was the first to feature neither Ballygunner or Mount Sion since 1993, and considering each championship was won between either one of those two clubs between 94 at 2006, to see Ballyduff and De La Salle win the championship the last two years is quite an achievement.

Pride Fighter

In my area I am near Crumlin GAA club and Good Counsel GAA club in the south of Dublin. I always see kids with their helmets and hurls heading to training or having a puck about on the greens. Dublin hurling is the next big thing and I hope to see the Dubs be a Kilkenny like force in the not too distant future.

blackbelt

From Artane near Parnell Park and have Craobh Ciaran (a historical Dublin hurling stronghold) and my own club St Vincents in my area.The small ball is definitely getting more popular and I believe that hurling in Vincents is on its way to becoming more popular than football.

Then on the southside you have Crumlin and Ballyboden St Endas and Kilmacud Crokes as the top hurling sides there.

Keith in cork

Pride Fighter wrote: »

In my area I am near Crumlin GAA club and Good Counsel GAA club in the south of Dublin. I always see kids with their helmets and hurls heading to training or having a puck about on the greens. Dublin hurling is the next big thing and I hope to see the Dubs be a Kilkenny like force in the not too distant future.

I'm also a dub, and have to agree its grown something amazing, even this year the papers were talking nonsense about us challenging for the all ireland. I left dublin in 1998, having won everything in our division, at 3 age groups, every blitz, all in football. Moved to cork then (age 10) and didn't know what a hurley was, let alone able to use one. Now i go back and all of my mates, their smaller bros and sisters and in some cases their kids, all own hurley's, play at school or for the local team. Something i never really expected. Its defo going to be the next big thing, not too distant future......wouldn't be that sure but its defo growing at an enormous rate.

I lived in galway for 4 years, for a county with some recent success at senior level, i didn't see very much sign of hurling up there. when i ventured out towards connemara and to more rural area's it was evident but thats always going to be the case. Going to watch some of their underage games, while i know their kids and learning, the level just isn't the same as here in cork.

I also lived in west limerick for 1.5yrs, until jan this year, and if ever i felt at "home" this was it. our village is located just 7miles from the cork border, maybe that has something to do with it, or maybe thats arrogant, but all the kids mix together and most attend the same school if not their family friends etc. They can't leave the house without a hurley, are always pucking about and because our village was "quiet" there was no problem in the younger kids nipping down to the gaa field, without parents having to worry. Place is always packed after school and now the evenings are getting longer it'll be alot busier.

From my view, its still strong and being put across well in munster, leinster is booming, and connaught.....well i wouldn't know, didn't see much evidence in 4 yrs! (oh and i lived beside the county training fields, even fed their senior football panel after training each week)

beggars_bush

hurling in connacht is struggling - especially in Roscommon. Mayo are improving slowly. sligo and leitrim only have a few clubs each. Small numbers of clubs outside of galway is the problem, nobody to run underage hurling teams in clubs and football people not wanting to promote hurling too much

Galway will always be strong

Keith in cork

beggars_bush wrote: »

football people not wanting to promote hurling too much

Hit the nail on the head.:cool:

Orizio

Thanks lad, keep them coming.

Noticed a couple of lads from Ballymun on the Dublin football Under-21 side, how much GAA would their be in that area?

Pride Fighter

Orizio wrote: »

Thanks lad, keep them coming.

Noticed a couple of lads from Ballymun on the Dublin football Under-21 side, how much GAA would their be in that area?

Ballymun Kikhams are a big club, produced some recent seniors lately.

Declan30

I Live in east Limerick and it is a mixture around where i am.
My own club only manily does Hurling. Sereval clubs in the east like Cappamore/Ahane and Pallasgreen will have teams in both codes and do ok as well.

South Limerick is the Same. Mixture of both codes played.
Just a example Garryspillane and Galbally are twin clubs. Garryspillane playing the hurling and Galbally play football players can play on both teams.
Same with Glenroe and ballylanders.

West Limerick is limericks football strong hold. Drom Broadford are current Munster Club Champions and a lot of the limerick Team is made up of west limerick players.

City .4 main clubs Na Pairisagh/claughan/St Patricks/Monaleen are the clubs and they play both codes.

Hope this helps i could go into more detail but i could bore u . As there is a lot more.

Benhonan

I'm from East Clare myself. Things are going well in the area, there was always a huge love of hurling in East Clare but never the titles to back it up. We (Clonlara) are county champions at the moment, having won it our first year up from intermediate, our first in about 90 years. Tulla won it last year, another east clare team who hadn't won it in about 70 years. The standard of club hurling in clare has definitely dropped, but it's good to see our area knocking the traditional powers like clarecastle, newmarket and the bridge.