Clubbing together yields rich dividends

THE relative lack of competitive games this weekend has a pretty simple explanation: it’s Lá nag Club, a day on which the GAA focuses on clubs rather than intercounty games.

Alan Milton of Croke Park explains the reasoning behind the GAA directive keeping tomorrow clear of intercounty activity.

“Obviously last year was different, the year that was in it. We appreciate that you won’t have the same number of clubs engaged in the same level of activities we had last year, but the clubs that have put the time into preparing should be given a clear run at it.

“If clubs schedule evening games as part of the celebrations, that’s fine. Concessions have been made in that counties have made allowances in terms of fixtures to facilitate it.”

The benefits of having an open day, or family day – call it what you will – have had an immediate effect, says Milton.

“We haven’t had the same level of consultation as last year, but that’s not surprising because up to last year a lot of clubs hadn’t run family days in years, if ever, so they were looking for direction. Now they can use the same template that they used last year.”

One club that’s pulling out all the stops is Carndonagh GAA club in Donegal. Elizabeth Doherty goes through the attractions on offer.

“Going on last year’s model, we’re going to parade through the town because the pitch is about a mile outside town. We’ll gather in the middle of the town and parade out in the club colours to Páirc Uí Dochartaigh.

“There we have mini-games organised for u8s to u12s in football, ladies football, hurling and camogie. We also have rounders, which was a big hit last year with the adults, in particular, as well as novelty games like puck fada and kick fada.”

At the opposite end of the country, Nemo Rangers of Cork are also staging a celebration of the club.

“We’re basing it on what we did last year as well,” says Nemo chairman Alfie Herbert. “We’ll have games – an underage blitz, and a skills competition – and we’ll have a novelty turn or two, like a father and son long puck. Then we’ll have music that night as well for people if they want to stay on and enjoy the evening.”

Carndonagh haven’t forgotten the entertainment either. “At the end of the day our treasurer is organising a barbecue,” says Doherty, having waited quarter of a century since their last family day.

“The last event that would have been similar would have been during the Centenary celebrations back in 1984, probably,” she says.

“We would have been trying to get a day in the calendar ourselves for a family day but when the national day was announced last year we used that.”

There’s been one immediate benefit to the Donegal club. Last year the new people who came to the premises liked what they saw.

“Yes, we got people who weren’t involved coming along, in particular those with young children. That’s great, though we didn’t really plan that things would turn out like that – it’s more a case of showing the locality that the GAA club is here, and we’d certainly be considering it for next year as well.”

Nemo Rangers didn’t quite reap that harvest, says Herbert. “We got minimal outside interest, to be honest. All the people we had there were families who’d be traditionally involved in the club.

“We had a lot of Nemo people there – we had a lot of kids there certainly, for a while the place was like a kindergarten – and it went off very well, people enjoyed themselves immensely. From that point of view it’s no harm to have it again this year, though the directive came down from the powers that be about it.

“It’s a nice way to show off the club and for people to get together without necessarily having a big game as the focus. That way the players can come along as well, the lads who’d normally be playing if it was a senior championship game, for instance.”

All things considered a positive development, then, though as Doherty and Herbert point out, there’s one element in the mix that you can’t plan for.

“The success of last year’s day has led to this year’s event,” says Milton. “Hopefully everybody gets the weather for it, but we can’t do anything about that.”