Páirc Uí Chaoimh: Family 'shocked and saddened' at Cork GAA naming rights deal
Páirc Uí Chaoimh. Picture: Eóin Noonan/Sportsfile
The grandson of the man after whom Cork’s Páirc Uí Chaoimh GAA stadium is named said he was “deeply shocked and saddened” by the proposal to drop his name under a new naming rights deal.
Padraig Ó Caoimh's grandson, Dónal, said he learned about the proposal through the media after the Irish Examiner first reported it on Monday.
The report revealed how a multi-layered naming rights deal for Páirc Uí Chaoimh, worth between €250,000 and €300,000 a year to Cork GAA, will be tabled for county board delegates to ratify on Tuesday night.
The proposed title sponsor for the stadium’s historic first naming rights will be SuperValu, with Cork’s GAA headquarters to be rebranded SuperValu Páirc or Park.
Three other companies — Boston Scientific, Statkraft and PepsiCo — will also have subsidiary stadium branding privileges as part of the package, believed to be for an initial three years.
The total package, which has been green-lit by the stadium board, is understood to be worth in the region of €1m up to 2026.
Dónal Ó Caoimh said nobody from the GAA contacted him to tell him this was being considered.
In a statement on Tuesday, he said: “My grandfather embodied the empathy, hospitality, and community spirit that is the essence of the GAA.
“His dream was inclusivity: to have a GAA-owned pitch in every parish.
"Under his stewardship, the GAA became the biggest amateur association of its kind in the world.
“It is galling to me that SuperValu would consider making the eradication of my grandfather’s legacy a condition of sponsorship.
“The gateway is open for the sale of our heritage and narrative for profit.
“You take away the absence of focus on money and corporations from games and you have lost what makes the GAA unique."
He said the cornerstone of the organisation "is volunteerism not corporations".
“The fact that the Cork County Board meeting tonight that will debate the proposal will be held behind closed doors for the first time is profoundly undemocratic.
“I have faith that Páirc Uí Chaoimh will forever retain its original name in the hearts and minds of the people of Cork.
"I understand the importance [of] raising funds for the sustainability of the GAA but there needs to be sensitivity to history.”
In a statement, Cork GAA CEO Kevin O’Donovan said it has a responsibility to ensure that it is on a firm financial footing to ensure the success of its games at both local and county level.
“To that end, the One Cork initiative has been seeking ways of securing additional income from appropriate sources that meet the goals and objectives of the wider organisation,” he said.
“A major opportunity to ensure the success of Cork GAA, supported by One Cork, was a wider commercial strategy.
“This includes naming rights for the biggest asset within its control, Páirc Uí Chaoimh.
“The matter is for discussion tonight (Tuesday) by County Board delegates, and it would be inappropriate to comment ahead of that meeting.
“However, it must be pointed out that any funding from such an arrangement will be used to help ensure that our games, from Rebel Óg to Inter-county, continue to grow in the years ahead.”
But Lord Mayor of Cork Cllr Kieran McCarthy urged a rethink on the deal.
He acknowledged SuperValu’s commitment to community, through its support of the national Tidy Towns initiative and its local support of various GAA clubs, but he said someone needed to look again at the terms and conditions of the stadium naming proposal.
“The name Páirc Uí Chaoimh is as synonymous with Cork as Shandon,” he said.
“Place, history and memory matter in Cork and it is sad to hear the memory of Pádraig Ó Caoimh very much eliminated in this proposal.”
He said Mr Ó Caoimh played a huge role in the development of the GAA in the early Irish Free State and he had left a huge legacy.
“His story still matters,” he said.
But Sinn Féin councillor Kenneth Collins went a step further and said SuperValu should withdraw the deal.
A lifelong member of St Vincent’s GAA Club, he said the GAA community was in shock over the renaming proposal.
“This is an insult to Ó Caoimh’s name. To remove his name from the stadium for a cheque? The county board should be ashamed of themselves. Money isn’t everything,” he said.
Pádraig Ó Caoimh was born in Roscommon in 1898 but moved to Cork City at an early age, and by 1911, is recorded as living with his family on Quaker Road.
He died in 1964. The Cork GAA stadium was opened in 1974 and named in his honour.
During the Irish War of Independence, he served with A Company (University Company), 2nd Battalion, No 1 Brigade, and in 1929, he was appointed secretary of the GAA, aged 31.
He helped organise the Tailteann Games and the Eucharistic Congress in Croke Park in 1932, helped stage the 1947 All-Ireland Senior Football Final in the Polo Grounds, New York, and crucially, he spearheaded a drive to have a GAA-owned pitch in every parish.
The number of pitches increased from 1,500 clubs in 1929 to more than 3,000 by 1963, with 400 grounds owned and properly vested in the GAA.
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