Spreading the good word in sunny Seville
Kevin Lenane stood in the usual spot in the The Merchant — an Irish pub in the centre of Seville. Just around the corner the busy bus station is shuttling tired professionals home for the night after a run-of-the-mill Tuesday in the city. Inside the city’s most popular Irish bar however, it’s St Patrick’s Day, 2009. And grand plans are hatched.
Lenane puts his drink on the bar, leans in to make himself heard above The Pogues and broaches a subject that’s been on his mind, with half of a dozen of his fellow ex-pats.
“I had this thing in my mind for a few years — setting up a GAA club — but there was never the numbers there,” Lenane says, when I call him at his desk this week. “There was always the older guys but we didn’t think we’d have enough to field a team.”
Then St Patrick oiled the wheels. “We were having a pint — probably having too many pints, if I’m honest — and we got talking about it again. There was seven or eight of us and we said we’d give it a go and surely we’d pick up a few more along the way.”
Some 125 years after Cusack and the lads sank a few at the founding of the Association in Liberty Square, Thurles, the Éire Óg Seville club was formed on Calle de Canalegas, Sevilla.
The Waterford man — an accomplished footballer in his own right — has been in Spain for over a decade. It was nice to unpack a piece of home which he had long since left in a dressing room corner back home.
“I came out here 11 years ago — I chased a girl. That old story,” he says with an audible smile. “I met her in Cork — I was working as a telecommunications engineer and she was studying.
“So I decided to chance my arm out here and see if I could take to Spanish life. I started working in a bar because I had no Spanish. But I worked my way up and I’m now in an office job which is a completely different ball game. We got married a couple of years ago and we have a daughter now too so I’m well settled.”
There was a handful like him around in Andalusia; those who crammed under the big screen on Sundays for big matches beamed from home. They pulled on the O’Neill’s nicks and dusty studs once again.
“It was November by time we got out to train [after the Paddy’s Day summit] but there was only a few of us turning up — four or five — and we thought the club might fold before we even played a game. But after Christmas — miraculously — there was a few students turned up and guys who we didn’t even know existed in the area.”
‘Los verdirojos’ or the green-and-reds were born. A motley crew of Irish ex-pats, English friends, Scandinavians, scholars and locals tugged on the adopted colours. The club made their debut in the Spanish championship — yes, there is such a wonderful thing — last year. This Saturday they host the Iberian GAA championship.
Teams from Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Marbella, A Coruña and Pamplona will take part in the event which will be held in the shadow of Seville’s famous old Olympic Stadium. Referees will be jetted in from the old sod. Games are 11-a-side, and games last 20 minutes. It’s a serious business.
“We made our debut in the Spanish championship in Marbella in 2010 which was a massive achievement. How did we get on? Not too good, to be honest. If there was six teams in it, we probably came sixth,” says Lenane. But the only way is up. Last year they went to Madrid and only lost out to Valencia in the semi-final by a kick of a ball.
This year, on their own citrus-scented turf, they mean business.
“We have an even better team now, having been together a few years and have gotten to know each other and improved. But more than that, we have a handful of Spanish lads too which is great. They got involved because they either saw the posters we put around the place or watched the games in the bars with us or experienced the game when they were travelling.”
And as in La Liga’s duopoly, the big boys with the targets on their backs this weekend wear famous crests on their chests.
“The heavyweights would be Barcelona, Madrid and Valencia are coming along now too. Pamplona is made up of entirely Basques. It’s an amazing achievement. The standard? I played senior for Ardmore and minor for the county. And I’d say the standard would be Junior A, maybe, in general. But saying that, a Barcelona or Madrid would match up to a good senior club side, I’d say, no problem.”
Win, lose or draw, however, The Merchant Bar will heave afterwards. And more plans will be made. “The best thing about it is the social aspect,” concludes Lenane, “I’m out here over a decade now and it’s good to get out and reconnect with your roots. And it’s an excuse to get out for a jars. Which is a big plus at my stage.”
Adrian@thescore.ie
@adrianrussell
