How a stubborn Corkman formed Mexico City's only GAA club
Members of the Los San Patricios men's team in Mexico City. The club means a disparate Irish community is more firmly linked to Mexico City and its people.
It took a madman from Cork, travelling halfway across the globe, for Mexico City to have its first and only GAA club.
While Pierce O’Driscoll contests the description of a madman by his teammates, he accepts that he was extremely stubborn in his efforts to set up one of the world’s newest GAA clubs.
His efforts culminated in Los San Patricios, the green and gold GAA team that is named for a heroic Irish brigade that fought and died for the Mexican army during the Mexican-American war.
Not only was this brigade regarded as one of the best fighting units during the war, but the battalion was also lionised by the Mexican public for their sacrifice during the key Battle of Chapultepec.
But why exactly did Mr O’Driscoll opt to set up the club? The idea came to him shortly after he arrived in the city in the autumn of 2022, having just finished up playing club football with Glanworth GAA.
He had been “institutionalised” by his love of the sport, and he wanted to quickly find a team where he could keep training and playing regularly. With no GAA club in the city, Mr O’Driscoll "fell in" with a group of Irish lads playing seven-a-side soccer.
As the group grew, the Corkman started to convince the players — from Ireland, England, and Mexico — to work with him towards starting a GAA club.
“I suppose every GAA club, someone had to start it somewhere,” Mr O’Driscoll said.
“The big thing was to try and put a structure in place. I was just a bit stubborn when I said I was going to do this. I wanted to do it properly and see the thing through.”
The first training sessions kicked off in January 2023, with small numbers turning up to train and play.
The biggest challenge was finding grass pitches in a densely populated city of nearly nine million people. Eventually, a grass pitch was secured, near the massive Chapultepec Park in the heart of Mexico City.
Initially, it was a few training sessions, but as the club took off more and more players began to take interest. While the Irish play a key role in Los San Patricios, more and more of the players are Mexicans.
This is particularly the case on the women’s team, with the number of Mexican players outstripping Irish and other immigrants on the squad.
Tania Colchado had initially been looking to join a soccer team but ended up finding the “best team” she could in Los San Patricios, while Cristina Santoyo discovered the team through Instagram.
“I’ve always been into sports and also trying to make new friends, so I tried something different and that’s how I found, on Instagram, the team,” Ms Santoyo said.
From her time on the team, Ms Colchado has been able to learn more about Irish culture, but it’s also allowed her to improve her English.
Ghislaine Mann, from Leicester originally, had initially gotten involved in GAA during university, citing her Irish roots through family in Limerick. She hadn’t played for over 10 years, but after members of the men’s team approached her to join, she decided to give it another go and she helped kickstart the women’s team.
“It was great to get back into it and then also it was nice to be able to help all the other girls because when we first started training, I was the only girl that had ever played before,” Ms Mann said. “It was brand new for everyone else.”
Mr O’Driscoll described the women’s team as being akin to a large group of friends, with the squad coming together and growing fast, as more and more people discovered the sport through social media.
When the club was in its early days, he wanted to ensure that locals were a big part of it to ensure that it wasn’t exclusively for Irish immigrants. It was about giving something back to the community which had been so welcoming.
In particular, Mr O’Driscoll told of how sport in Mexico can be seen as a status symbol, with more affluent people being able to afford club membership fees.
“You’ll often find with some of these kinds of sports, like rugby or tennis or anything, it’s like a status thing and you need money to play it,” Mr O’Driscoll said. “We were conscious that we would try and keep it free.”
Since being set up last year, both teams have left Mexico City and travelled northwards for games with their US counterparts. The men’s team had their first tournament last April, travelling to Texas to face off against teams from Austin, Houston, and San Antonio.
They managed to take home a few wins in their first tournament, but when they went off to the US Nationals they faced much stiffer competition.
“Ultimately, we were humbled — which is the best way to put it — at the US Nationals, put in our place,” said Blaine Doyle, a member of the men’s team.
The women’s team, meanwhile, had their first tournament out in Houston, with Ms Mann describing it as an “amazing” experience.
“We had our first three games and we were really proud of how we did considering everyone else on the team, apart from myself, had never played a proper game before,” Ms Mann said.
“We’ve had no one to practice against, we had no other teams to play against. We had to just make the best of what we had,” she said, adding that some of the men’s team acted as stand-ins during training matches ahead of the tournament.
She’s optimistic that more people will get on board in the coming year, with hopes that the club will establish a youth team in the months ahead.
“It would be great if we could start introducing youth programming and getting the next generation involved, because obviously, as international people, sometimes we travel, and we move on,” Ms Mann said.
“On the girls' team, we have so many Mexican players that I think there could be more of a grassroots culture developing.”
What of the club’s chairperson and founder? He’s since made his return to Cork after his time in the Mexican sun.
Despite being halfway around the world, Mr O’Driscoll is set to continue as chairperson and hopes that he’ll be able to travel for some future matches in the US.
When asked how he feels to have been instrumental in the creation of a GAA club over 8,000km away from his native county, Mr O’Driscoll says: “It sounds a bit cheesy but it is nice to give something back when you’re welcomed in their city.
“Now you’ve introduced something new, just sharing your culture. It’s great that they’ve embraced it and they can make it their own.”
While Mr O’Driscoll might be gone, the not-mad-but-stubborn Corkman has left a legacy behind in Los San Patricios, with a disparate Irish community now more firmly linked to Mexico City and its people.
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