Columns - Irish Examiner

Paul Rouse

The glorious birth of Irish sportswriting

The relationship between sport and the media changed in Ireland on Christmas week in 1880.

Fri, 29 Dec, 2017

Leading GAA’s new era is strictly business

There is a fascinating line in the job description issued by the GAA as it seeks a new Director-General.

Fri, 22 Dec, 2017

Cockfighting, cruelty, and Ireland’s history of bloodsports

The renewed growth of cockfighting in Britain is a reminder that the ways of the past are not easily shaken, writes Paul Rouse.

Fri, 15 Dec, 2017

Do GAA clubs make the best use of their membership?

Back in 1909, Michael Collins was the secretary of the Geraldines GAA Club in London. He was still a very young man — yet to assume the political leadership that saw him become one of the most influential Irishmen ever born — but he had an intimate understanding of the things that make a great GAA club.

Fri, 08 Dec, 2017

No money or medals can save you from sporting end

Listening this week to the former rugby international Luke Fitzgerald talking about his retirement from the game was a reminder that there is only one certainty in every sporting career: it will end, writes Paul Rouse.

Fri, 01 Dec, 2017

Charting the development of modern Irish athletics

The weekly fun and games that flows from RTÉ’s Ireland’s Greatest Sporting Moment programme is a timely reminder of the importance of athletics in Irish sporting history. 

Fri, 24 Nov, 2017

From wife-carrying to faction-fighting: Sporting success comes in many shapes and sizes

What are the limits of the sporting world? Where does sport begin and end? The difficulties in answering those questions are manifest whenever you move beyond the mainstream that dominates the sporting media in the western world, writes Paul Rouse.

Fri, 17 Nov, 2017

When sporting events become political protests

The use of sport as a place of political protest is not new. For as long as modern organised sport has existed in Ireland, people have sought to use sporting events to make political protests.

Fri, 10 Nov, 2017

Super 11s Boston junket in tune with the age of spin

The assault on the importance of language and facts continues apace. Propagandists are not new to our world, but their capacity to spread their message is now much greater than before. 

Fri, 03 Nov, 2017

What type of men win an All-Ireland in time of war?

In considering these men, it is impossible to ignore the political climate of 1917, writes Paul Rouse.

Fri, 27 Oct, 2017