'The GAA’s mantra is where we all belong - setting up this club shows that that’s true'

Karl Shannon is chairman of Na Gaeil Aeracha, Ireland’s first explicitly LGBTQ inclusive GAA club. 

Rainbow coloured laces are seen on the boots of Mayo’s Aidan O’Shea during the All-Ireland SFC semi-final against Tipperary in 2020. Picture: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

Last weekend Ballymun Kickhams took on Na Gaeil Aeracha in the outer reaches of the Dublin GAA galaxy.

The exact grade needn’t detain us unduly. The game was remarkable because it was the first competitive fixture for “Ireland’s first explicitly LGBTQ inclusive GAA team”, to use their own term.

Let Karl Shannon, chair of Na Gaeil Aeracha, explain how it all grew out of a single tweet in August 2020.

“At the time I really wanted to get back into playing and I saw teams in other sports, like the Emerald Warriors in rugby, and I was thinking ‘why isn’t there something like this in GAA?’

“So I sent out a tweet just asking if people would be interested in getting involved.”

As the kids say, the tweet blew up.

“I didn’t expect it to take off the way it did — there were a thousand retweets, hundreds of comments discussing it and I couldn’t even begin to count the number of people who reached out to me privately, by DM and so on, so after that I was locked in. I had to get something up and going.”

Shannon got some likeminded people into a committee and, in his words, “started attacking it”.

“I hadn’t the first clue about starting a club from scratch, but we had some contacts.

“Geraldine McTavish, the GAA’s own diversity and inclusion officer was immensely helpful. She told us what steps we needed to take initially.

“Aidan Walsh with Sporting Pride was a huge help too. It was all about working it out as we went along.

“We’ve had so much contact with so many people on the GAA and the LGFA side — we’re very happy with the support we’ve got. A lot of the work fell on the committee but we just put our heads together and the drive that there was for it motivated us to go for it.

“I know the GAA’s mantra is ‘where we all belong’ and I think the setting up of the club shows that that’s true.”

Gaelic games tend to work in a competitive structure rather than a social setting.

As Shannon says, small-sided games aren’t as fulfilling as the full complement, so numbers were the first challenge.

“They were, because 15-on-15 is what you want, but if there’s even a match between yourselves it’s 30  people before you get into subs.

“But thankfully we have the numbers, which is great. We have approximately 60 registered for GAA and approximately 45 for LGFA, so that’s over 100 members.

“I knew we would be okay for numbers as soon as the tweet took off, and it’s been great.”

Was he surprised by the numbers of people looking for this outlet rather than a ‘mainstream’ GAA club?

“I was surprised by the numbers from the time of the response to the initial tweet, I’d expected a few people interested in a social game.

“But I wasn’t surprised by the stories I heard because I have that kind of story myself — the reason I set it up was because I wanted to play. Not that I’ve had trouble before but I just didn’t feel comfortable in a ‘mainstream’ club.

“When you’re a member of the LGBTQ community there can be some fear, some apprehension, about getting involved in typically straight places, put it that way.

“So when I saw the Emerald Warriors I was thinking I’d like something like that for our community.”

There were other positive signs during the week in the form of the UL Sigerson jerseys, which featured the Pride colours.

“It’s really great to see,” says Shannon.

“It’s comforting. It’s become almost a standard thing now and not given too much coverage as a result — but it means so much to us.

“I know other teams have done it, putting little pride flags on the jersey, and that kind of special nod makes you feel welcome.”

Last weekend, though, the game against Ballymun was the culmination of a lot of work.

“Yes, that was our first formal, official game, but in fairness I have to point out that the LGFA team has had a season of games already, they played last year.

“The feedback was phenomenal from the Ballymun game, they were absolutely great and all the lads had a great time.

“There was no trouble at all — and we weren’t expecting any in the first place, in fairness.

“We have a lot of beginners on our team — we definitely didn’t win the game put it that way — and a lot of the lads hadn’t played since they were 14, 15, but it was a great experience.”

Is that one of the aims? To give some kid at that age encouragement when they’re beginning to waver?

“Yes, I’d like to think so.

“I know when I look back at myself at that age and participating in the sport, I stopped when I was around 15, but if I’d seen something like this it would have encouraged me to keep at it.

“If I had known it existed it would have given me some encouragement.”