Sport

Danny Hughes: Appreciating the positives of GAA family, club, community

As children up and down the country returned to underage training with their clubs in the last couple of weeks, the true value of the GAA volunteer has been evident.  Picture by Mal McCann 
As children up and down the country returned to underage training with their clubs in the last couple of weeks, the true value of the GAA volunteer has been evident.  Picture by Mal McCann  As children up and down the country returned to underage training with their clubs in the last couple of weeks, the true value of the GAA volunteer has been evident.  Picture by Mal McCann 

On Sunday past, I took my five-year-old and three-year-old children to my club, Saval, to indoctrinate them into the GAA life.

My wife laments the fact that I can come across as quite ‘pushy’ and the last thing she wants is for my unhealthy obsession, to become their unhealthy obsession.

I guess when you play senior club football for 21 plus years, you forget where and how it started.

On Sunday, we had more kids playing than I even knew existed within our parish.

The coaches of the teams were brilliantly organised and how they interacted with the boys and girls was remarkable.

I thought I knew something about coaching and football but actually, I realised on Sunday that I know nothing.

Convincing a five-year-old to focus on kicking a ball or to assemble in a straight line is a lesson in diplomacy.

The real heroes in the GAA are the volunteers who coach our young people.

I often wondered how those coaches I was fortunate to play under, who didn’t have a stake in the team via a son or daughter, managed to motivate themselves to selflessly give up their time for Saval.

This is the case in clubs up and down the country.

We had talked about Sundays first Under 7 session for a few weeks and after a slow start, my five-year-old daughter soon became invested in the games.

My three-year-old took to the training like a duck to water and in ‘raid the nest’ accumulated for herself everyone’s share of the treasure.

A few of the coaches commented that she took after her father in respect of not wanting to part with the ball.

Despite the grey weather and dampness underfoot, the spirits among all those congregated where as high as I have ever seen.

Parents stayed close by and watched on.

Many years ago, I remember team-mates who were six and seven years of age religiously walking to the club field for training.

They would train and walk home via the road or over the fields.

Times have changed and parents appear more protective and invested in the GAA training nowadays and in many ways this can only be a good thing.

When I scanned around my own club, we have two fields, a significant sports complex equipped with handball alleys and four changing rooms, a significant hall and a thriving lounge (when open).

In 1995, the members and volunteers built the first hall, changing room and lounge.

Before that time, we changed in porta-cabins with holes in the wall.

You could see and hear the opposition team being called out.

The changes are staggering.

The GAA, of which I am a stakeholder, is phenomenal in many respects and the explosion in the popularity of the game has filtered funds down to clubs such as ours since the Nineties.

The inter-county game is the family silver and in terms of maximising the commercial revenues, one has to admit that Corporate GAA has played a blinder.

There are no free lunches and the other side of that coin is that counties and clubs have been overextending themselves from a financial perspective.

COVID may have temporarily halted this runaway train, but as time moves on, my fear is that counties in particular will revert to type.

Most clubs now have increased membership fees to reflect the significant costs of running our clubs.

Now in my opinion, more often than not, in most, if not all clubs, we do get value for money.

For example, as a founding member of Club Saval, I pay £220 per year and this now includes my family (wife and three kids) and five lotto tickets each week.

You are also insured on the premises and given the facilities and coaching, I still contend it’s a bargain.

One single membership of a gym will be minimally £30 per month (£360 annually).

If I were playing devil’s advocate, I would argue that the local GAA club has always undercharged its members.

Quite often, the local GAA club has been treated like a day-care centre and parents have used it to get a few hours of free time.

Parenting has changed and the average clubs facilities have become much better, being much more family friendly.

Often you will find swings, slides and climbing frames and a space selling tea and coffee.

Getting back to last Sunday, being the slightly psychopathic parent that I am, I gravitate toward my own two girls and when some overly zealous tackle lands them on the ground, I want to retaliate by pushing the offender to the ground.

My wife told me that I have serious anger issues and while I jest at the very thought, parenting will bring that side out in you.

My father, god bless him, was a tough man to please.

In fact, you had to really earn his praise.

He never praised us (my brothers and I) in public either.

He was the very opposite of those who see no wrong in their own child.

Before the strap was banned, I received three of the best from the primary school principal for talking in class.

Had I told my dad, he would have inflicted further punishment.

You were always guilty and you needed to prove your innocence.

Admittedly, it did me no harm.

In modern times, parenting can be tough.

Around every corner, an expert will produce a study to say that you are doing it wrong.

My old worries are no longer my worries of today.

My old worries were of the most part selfish and self-absorbed.

Now they revolve around your wife and kids, your family and those closest to you.

If this pandemic changed anything for me personally, it was an appreciation of the positives of being able to throw your own kids back into group activity.

It is the appreciation of community and the wonderful work my own club has done and that of all clubs.

It is the beauty of our inter-county game, to appreciate the players, who are, and continue to be, the family jewels.

It is from this source that the GAA has been able to build and generate revenues that have helped build a club infrastructure all over the world.

For that I am greatly appreciative.