Are there clubs which are NOT based on parishes?

quintain

In the cities in the country or for any other reason are there any clubs which are based on anything other than the strict parish rule?

Screaminmidget

Id Imagine there are many tbh.
My Own Club (Dr.Crokes) Is based loosely on the fact that you have to live in the town, but there are people from farther out that play.Also, the Legion GAA club are only accross the road, so People could be living next to eachother and play for different clubs.

keane2097

Have never heard of the clubs in Tralee being based on parishes.

nice_guy80

Westmeath has NO parish rule

Drummerboy2

There is new club in Dublin based on Irish language users.

quintain

Thanks for the replies everybody. Very interesting, I thought most clubs around the country were based on parishes, but there seems to be plenty of clubs that are not.

Thanks again
quintain

ballsymchugh

i'd say most clubs are based on a collection of townlands, as are some parishes. but the parish may not have the same collection of townlands as the club.

Blackjack

Well, to a large extent, Parishes are just easier to decide on "Dividing lines" as it were, therefore defining who you should play for, or at least back back in earlier part the 20th Century.
Communities were based largely around Parishes then, so it probably just made more sense.

ardmacha

Communities were based largely around Parishes then, so it probably just made more sense.

Parishes were drawn up to reflect communities, and were of a particular size, so it made sense to use their boundaries.

Crossmaglen Rangers, All Ireland football champions, share a parish with 3 other clubs, although in fairness it is a larger than usual parish and one club also takes players from the neighbouring parish. A case of a parish boundary not being the community boundary.

Kojak

Am I right in saying that De La Sal from Waterford are not based on a parish? I seem to remember hearing that they were just based around the de la sal school, but had not real defined boundaries. However, I am open to correction on this.

mc_grens

The Civil Service club in Dublin.

deisemum

Kojak wrote: »

Am I right in saying that De La Sal from Waterford are not based on a parish? I seem to remember hearing that they were just based around the de la sal school, but had not real defined boundaries. However, I am open to correction on this.

I think you're correct. My son went to Ballygunner primary school and now De La Salle College and plays for Ballygunner club, our neighbour 3 doors from me went to St. Declans then De La Salle College and plays for De La Salle Club.

My son also plays gaelic for Gaultier and his team has a lot of Ballygunner and Passage hurlers on it.

comeraghs

in Waterford City your club depends on which primary school you went to. obviously most people go to the school closest to their house so while it isn't parish rule it is a bit geographic, In the area up around Hillview/Lismore park ... you could have 4 guys living in houses next to each other & playing with any one of Mount Sion, De La Salle, Roanmore or St Pauls. Erins Own are down around Poleberry, Ballygunner out the Dunmore East Road & Ferrybank across the river Suir.

Kojak

All college teams (or clubs if you want to call them that) would be more examples of clubs that are not based on a parish.

What's the story with divisional teams? For example, South Kerry won the Kerry football championship 3 or 4 times in a row but were never allowed into the Munster Football championship. Would they be based on parish boundaries or moreso geographic location?

Agus

Kojak wrote: »

All college teams (or clubs if you want to call them that) would be more examples of clubs that are not based on a parish.

What's the story with divisional teams? For example, South Kerry won the Kerry football championship 3 or 4 times in a row but were never allowed into the Munster Football championship. Would they be based on parish boundaries or moreso geographic location?

Divisional teams are basically combinations of non-senior clubs so they are based on whatever the component clubs are based on.

rebel girl 15

Kojak wrote: »

All college teams (or clubs if you want to call them that) would be more examples of clubs that are not based on a parish.

What's the story with divisional teams? For example, South Kerry won the Kerry football championship 3 or 4 times in a row but were never allowed into the Munster Football championship. Would they be based on parish boundaries or moreso geographic location?

AFAIK, no divisional teams are allowed play in Munster club championships in GAA and camogie.

City/town clubs are based on where people are living and want to play - other than that they are based on parishes afaik

jordainius

In Limerick, there is no parish rule in Limerick city but there is in the rest of the county.

The lack of parish rule in the city has ultimately proven to be the downfall of a handful of great clubs, the likes of Treaty Sarsfields and Young Irelands who won ten senior hurling titles between them (and a few football too I believe) went extinct decades ago, as these clubs didn't have a traditional catchment area, or any strong community base. Over time they just faded away, gradually going down the divisions.

Clubs like Claughaun are now starting to struggle, Claughaun had a terrible year in 2010, losing their senior status in both codes, they now find themselves struggling to field teams in some age grades at underage level too. A slide which hopefully can be arrested, as they have had a major impact on Limerick GAA history in both codes.

There are 4 divisions in Limerick GAA- City, East, South and West. Each one gets to enter a team in the Inter-Divisional championship, where they can pick a panel of players from all non senior clubs in the division. The winner of the Inter-Divisional championship wins a place in the county senior hurling championship. The championship was resurrected in 2006 after a long absence, and in recent years, Emmets (the south team) have dominated, and have shown well in the county championship too, reaching the final last year. As has already been said in other posts, a divisional team is not allowed enter the provincial club championship.

Edit; actually, I forgot one old club, the club who sits top of the limerick senior football championship roll of honour; Commercials. A team which was formed in the 1880's which was formed to give shopworkers and tradesmen of Limerick city something to do in their time off work. I think it was specifically for out of towners who had to come and live in the city to work (not certain though). They were the dominant force of Limerick football until they too suffered from having no community base, no home to speak of, no underage talent to develop and they faded away into obscurity and ultimately extinction.

hardybuck

De La Salle will draw players from literally opposite sides of the city. The base is the DLS schools, two primary and one secondary.

St Declans draws a lot of lads from the Dunmore Rd area and around the Grange areas. While some of them may go on to play for the likes of Ballygunner, most will funnel into DLS.

St Stephens is in a different part of the city, and gets a lot of inner city kids and up around the Hillview and Ballybricken areas.

DLS secondary is then a massive school of over 1000 pupils, with lads coming in from all over the city, in from the likes of Dunmore East and south Kilkenny. By this time most of the lads will have clubs nailed down, but a lot of the teachers involved in coaching are DLS members.

DLS and Roanmore have pitches which are literally side by side, and both moved up to a new area of the city called Gracedieu to start on greenfield sites in an area of the city earmarked for huge expansion.

In the space of a literally a couple of miles you would find DLS, Roanmore, St Saviours, St Pauls and Mount Sion club grounds.

Peace

I don't think clubs in dublin are bound by any parish rule. They will take players from anywhere.

Frank Spencer

Peace wrote: »

I don't think clubs in dublin are bound by any parish rule. They will take players from anywhere.

What do you mean by "They will take players from anywhere"?

Peace

Frank Spencer wrote: »

What do you mean by "They will take players from anywhere"?

They will take players from any part of Dublin, not just the parish where their clubhouse/pitch is located.

quintain

Thanks folks for all the replies. this has turned out to be a very interesting thread. It seems to me that in the cities the parish rule is not as prevalent as in rural areas.

That bit of Limerick history was very interesting, Commercials fading away was because they had no base. For a healthy scene we need lots of healthy clubs and they all need to establish some sort of base.

In Waterford things do seem to be broadly based on National schools, De La Salle (2 schools !!), Mount Sion, Erins Own (scol Lorcan) St Pauls - but where do Roanmore get the kids? It must be very difficult competing if you don't have a connection with a school

O Riain

quintain wrote: »

Thanks folks for all the replies. this has turned out to be a very interesting thread. It seems to me that in the cities the parish rule is not as prevalent as in rural areas.

That bit of Limerick history was very interesting, Commercials fading away was because they had no base. For a healthy scene we need lots of healthy clubs and they all need to establish some sort of base.

In Waterford things do seem to be broadly based on National schools, De La Salle (2 schools !!), Mount Sion, Erins Own (scol Lorcan) St Pauls - but where do Roanmore get the kids? It must be very difficult competing if you don't have a connection with a school

Roanmoare from a similar area as DLS up around hillview and as a matter of fact have gone senior again this year in the hurling.