Sport can produce the greatest of emotions and it does not always need to be on the biggest of stages.

I have been privileged to have worked in and around sport over many years and to have built a business in Sport for Business that brings me into daily contact with the people, the events and the sporting moments that make up a rich tapestry of engagement that is never the same from one day to the next.

A constant in that over the past 12 years has been my involvement with my local GAA club Cuala who on Friday became AIB All Ireland Club Hurling Champions, the first time a club from Dublin had scaled such heights.

Wide Eyes

It was a victory carved out by a panel of players and management that were as focused as any team playing for millions in the Champions’ League but who are standing on the shoulders of generations that have gone before and a new generation that will have watched through wide eyes and been hooked on sport for ever as a result.

I’ve had the pleasure to have played many roles in the club, from bottle washer to bainisteoir, social night steward to committee chair and pretty much all points along the way. That’s the way in any sporting club, it never happens by chance and it only happens when many people play many parts.

The journey to this triumph at Croke Park took many twists and turns along the way. The majority of those playing on Friday started out balancing bean bags on tiny hurls in the first years of an academy section founded by their fathers and grandfathers who recognised that the club needed to cater for youth in order to survive and thrive in an area not given over at first glance to a passion for gaelic games.

Those same Fathers and Mothers gathered on the night before the game to reminisce in an ‘Up for the Match’ style event in the Club bar which honoured those who have gone before and left behind something that money could never buy.

Family

The event was compered by a local member of an Garda Siochana who had grown up with the club as his family and who guided us through the stories that told of a life in sport that makes sport so important.

The event took place as the final bars of the Siege of Ennis faded in the hall next door where a fundraising St Patrick’s Day Ceilí had raised around €1000 for the 2005 girls football and Camogie group.

The Fear an Tí for that event was the headmaster of the local Gaelscoil, the organiser in chief of the homecoming party planned for the players the following day and another of the myriad busy people who give of their time to make sure that stuff happens.

Within 12 hours the crowds were gathering for face painting, sausage rolls and a colourful march through the closed off streets of Dalkey, perhaps better known up until now as a literary hub with some nice restaurants.

Festooned

Every one of those restaurants, as well as the pubs, butchers, supermarkets, library and gift shops were festooned in red and white as over 2,000 marched towards the dart station where two chartered trains waited to carry us on the next leg of a club journey that a few short years ago could barely have been imagined.

They were joined by many more who travelled towards the Cusack Stand in number and who brought the stadium to life as the team fulfilled their final part of the bargain by lifting the trophy.

Oisin Gough who captained the team with ferocity from the full back line delivered a speech that recalled the greats no longer with us, including Peter Dunne, father of Club Chairman Adrian, who had been buried only five days previously but who will have found somewhere in heaven a place to watch down from and celebrate.

Ultra’s

He paid tribute to the Ultra’s a group of teenagers who have been getting into trouble for weeks over skipping study, skipping practice for the school production of Grease and creating memories which stay in their minds until they are the ones looking back on a life of sport and marking this as one of the high points.

The team came back eventually to Dalkey where a stage had been erected alongside the pitches that Cuala shares with Dalkey United.  They were hailed by a crowd tired from a long day but ready to raise the roof one more time for the returning local heroes.

The Local County Council Cathaoirleach Cormac Devlin wished them well as did Dublin GAA County Board Chairman Sean Shanley, brought up on stage by his one time predecessor and another local councillor John Bailey.

It was the players and the manager Mattie Kenny though that owned the night.  They spoke of a future to be built on what was happening in the present and brought the crowd through one last, for now, rendition of the Thunderclap.

They paid tribute to their sponsors local car dealer Paddy Connolly whose sponsorship was for a year but who the club kept on board through the run to March in a gesture of loyalty that is a measure of what the spirit of local sport is about.

There had been an offer of €20,000 to sponsor the shirts at Croke Park but that is one which can only now be considered as the club builds back again to retain the title and create a dynasty like that of Birr or Athenry who won seven titles between them from 1997 to 2003, or Portumna who won four between 2006 and 2014.

But those are thoughts for tomorrow.  The team came back again on Saturday afternoon for a session with the younger members of the club.  Shane Stapleton, a regular now on Off the Ball as a GAA analyst who sat on the bench, ready but not needed the previous day told me they thought there would be a few dozen, instead there were hundreds more.

Personal

The played signed every shirt and every hurl, they smiled for every selfie and shook every hand.  This was their club, their people, their moment in the personal history of people they have known for years and people they may never know but who will remember them and this day for a lifetime.

Peter Dunne’s Granddaughter Jennifer could not be there on Saturday as she was playing football with the Dublin Minors.  There were games going on across the City featuring teams in the Cuala Red and White and this team themselves will be back in training after a few weeks ready to do it all over again

It’s what sport is all about at it’s core.  It’s the value of club, the value of community, the powerful antidote to whatever struggles people may be facing in their own lives and an instance where we could all let go and enjoy one moment of joy to last a lifetime.

Image Credits: Tommy Dickson Inpho and Justin Farrelly