Fair plé díobh, a Loch Garman.
The GAA and An Ghaeilge go hand in hand. The Cumann Lúthchleas Gael was established in 1884 with the intention of promoting Irish culture, Irish traditions and to bring pride of place and identity to our great country.
Back then, Gaeilge was the first language of a greater percentage of our population than it is now, but it’s great to see, through TG4, through Irish schools and other mediums that the importance of our native tongue is still being emphasised.
Only last week, Cuala and Dublin hurler Darragh O’Connell revealed that he often speaks as Gaeilge to his teammates on the field of play. Growing up in the Gaeltacht area in West Kerry, the athletic midfielder was raised as a Gaeilgeoir.
When he made the transfer to Dublin club Cuala due to his work situation, he never expected to be able to continue his tradition of ag labairt trí Gaelige on the playing fields. But to his surprise, most of the Cuala lads are líofá and they regularly converse in Irish.
Wexford GAA have become the latest to promote the use of Irish in the GAA.
In an age of social media dominating the lives of many of our daoine óga, it’s great to see the Model County using the platform to its advantage to try and bring a bit of colour back to the language.
On Wednesday afternoon, the county board announced the launch of a project whereby they will part-fund the trips of some of their young GAA players to an Irish college during the summer.
The player’s club, the Wexford county board will combine to offer an Irish scholarship to a host of their young GAA players.
“In 2018, Wexford GAA will part-fund scholarships for club members of secondary school age to attend a 2-week residential course in Coláiste Laighean, which is held in Good Counsel College New Ross. We have been offered a reduced rate by Coláiste Laighean for 21 Wexford GAA students and the scheme is based on the player, the player’s Club and Wexford GAA paying one-third each of the total cost,” read a statement on their website.
Details of this year’s Irish Scholarship https://t.co/bdZW77lmQu via @officialwexgaa
— Wexford GAA (@OfficialWexGAA) February 15, 2018
You can read more about the initiative here.
It’s great to see a county actively promoting the language amongst their young players. It’s great to see them caring about the culture, about their players.
Hopefully other counties, and other youngsters will catch on.
Tús maith leath na hoibre.
