A "Real GAA Man" Views on the LOI - Be Afraid, Be Very Afraid

[Jamjar]

The reason I was an English c unt (apparently)

So are you no longer an English c unt ?

[John83]

So are you no longer an English c unt ?

He had a sex change. Now he's a Chinese Richard - a Wang.

[Lim till i die]

The GAA is dead. You heard it here first.

Wishful thinking here.

The combined attendances at Limericks 4 Munster championship games last year was roughly 150,000

Which is pretty darn healthy no matter what way you look at it.

[ciaraa]

I think you just paid Marty Morrissey a compliment there.

pure class

[Comic Book Guy]

The way I see it is that some of these Gah heads (especially those besotted with 'football') are the way they are because deep down they realise their hybrid game is vastly inferior to the association variety.
Even within GAA circles there are those hurling folk who look down on their 'football' cousins.
All I would say to those people in your school is f*** them, if you provoked that type of a repsonse from them then the EL must be doing something right.

[BohDiddley]

However, and I ask this in deadly earnest, is the person who made that remark any worse than some of the people who post similar sentiments on these forums, albeit from the other side of the coin?

What a pathetic defence. This one comes up in almost every thread citing GAA bigotry and only the most feeble-minded are taken in by it.
Football people in Ireland are exercised about GAA only insofar as that organization maintains the kind of attitude reported in the original post. You talk about the other side of the coin: where have you seen this level of ignorance aimed by a football person at GAA or any other sport at community level?

[kingdomkerry]

im obviously in a minority here but the way i see it i am a sports fan. i love soccer, football, hurling and rugby. My first love was always soccer. one thing i hate is people who support "the pool and utd" There is'nt any kerry team in the loi but i still follow it because its my league. I support kerry in the football because I love it when it comes to the crunch. I understand yere point about the narrow scope "gaa heads" but remember this is a tiny minority. Most gaa people i know are sports fans brought up in a gaa area and would not object to a loi club trying to make something of itself.

[oldyouth]

It is because of Gah heads like this, that I have returned (after a long absence) to LOI football to follow Wexford Youths. OK, the standard is not great at the moment but Mick Wallace has brought senior football to a Hurdlin' county.....and the Gah heads don't like it. Not only that, he has taken away the traditional sh*te that they use to put the game down, such as begging for money & pitches, professional sportsmen, not linked to the community etc. This is a sport for all club

All they have been left with is shouting about breaches of planning regulations. The Beautiful Game is here to stay in Wexford. Get used to it......

PS It's nice to see that the Youths all weather pitches are being used on Saturday mornings by dozens of young kids for hockey practice. Why not???

[Ash]

A local very wealthy business person laughed jeeringly and stated "we don't want to be exposing the kids around here to that rubbish!"

"The kids around here have GAA, they don't need soccer. We shouldn't even have a bloodly soccer league in this country as it takes funding away from GAA..."

I've known ardent GAA men like that in the past ... and they are usually the
1st ones in the pub on a Sunday, all decked out in their colours ... to watch
Liverpool or Man U.

I have a vague memory of one occasion years ago when a man like that
was lapping up the Ford Super Sunday and someone asked if he'd head up
to the pitch to help umpire or something for a Junior B game. His response
was something like ... "This match is more important than that sh!te" ...
and then he kissed the Liverpool crest!

[Straightstory]

What a nasty bunch of bigots the GAA are. And nobody's even mentioned their crude sectarianism... (Oh! - I've just done it there).

[shedite]

GAA fans don't understand LOI
LOI fans don't understand GAA.

Why can't we all just get along.

[twowheelsonly]

A GAA club here in Cork rents out it's all-weather pitches to a number of local Soccer clubs on a regular basis and are quite happy to take their money. However when a few of these clubs wanted to get together to hold a charity tournament (for a sick young fella AFAIR but I'm not positive) they were told in no uncertain terms that there was no way that any 'foreign game' was holding a tournament on their premises. But yes they could still use the pitches for training!!!!! Hypocrites of the highest order.

[Réiteoir]

There is'nt any kerry team in the loi but i still follow it because its my league.

Do you not go and watch the Kerry League side when they play in the eL Cup and FAI Cup?

[Hibernian]

A lot of members of a GAA club I was part of before I moved out of Dublin for a while attend Pats games players from this club also play football as well as GAA. Theres no ill feeling with any clubs or vice versa.

Also I know of some other clubs that even share facilities.

I find its mainly the older GAA members that provide barriers and who have the hardoned attitudes.

They'll eventually die off.

Any younger members I know or have coached tend to love any sort of sport and were encouraged to play whatever in our eyes keeping them off the street was just as important as fielding a team.

Its not uncommon to see young people in Ballyfermot DLS/Liffey Gaels jackets for example at Richmond and that has been the case for years.

At the end of the day sports clubs/associations should not be at war.

They should be all pushing for the one goal keeping children off the streets and away from drink and drugs.

Agree with you there great post

[gspain]

in fairness the GAA have come a long way in recent years. they still have a way to travel particularly in Northern Ireland although the anti football stuff there is tied into a lot of other things. Guys like Kennedy in Thomas Davis would have been the norm a few years back but now they are isolated much more and in many ways figures of fun.

Football is already by far the biggest sport in the country albeit not LoI football. It's the biggest participant sport but unfortunately for fans of the domestic game this translates into people who play on a sunday morning and watch Man Utd or Liverpool from a barstool on sunday afternoon. They probably go to watch Dublin (or whoever) in the GAA championship as well.

GAA is by far the biggest spectator sport. I'd love it to be true but I don't see domestic football challenging the GAA from that perspective for a very long time. Unfortunately there are still far higher leves of football being played elsewhere whereas the best GAA players play here.

They days of broken glass being spread in goalmouths, goalposts being chopped down etc are gone. Even 10 years ago it would have been impossible to imagine football and rugby being played in Croke Park.

[Rocky77]

What a pathetic defence. This one comes up in almost every thread citing GAA bigotry and only the most feeble-minded are taken in by it.
Football people in Ireland are exercised about GAA only insofar as that organization maintains the kind of attitude reported in the original post. You talk about the other side of the coin: where have you seen this level of ignorance aimed by a football person at GAA or any other sport at community level?

My OPINION is pathetic is it? And for the record, I'd like to think i'm not feeble-minded, but fair. I hate bitterness, as I said earlier. Everyone should have the opportunity to participate in everything and, call me naive, but I'd like to see all sporting bodies strong and healthy, not to the detriment of others.

Where have I seen ignorance? In posts like "The GAA are bigots". Do mean to claim that something like that is a well-rounded, reasoned suggestion? I know some members who are bigoted, I know some members who aren't.

I'm sorry i got dragged into this

[jebus]

I'm sorry i got dragged into this

If ever there was a motto for debates on Foot.ie

[oldyouth]

GAA fans don't understand LOI
LOI fans don't understand GAA.

Why can't we all just get along.

I think the difference bewteen the two is that Football fans don't actively try to put GAA down

[Erstwhile Bóz]

That GAA man sounds like a sap. Great fodder for the defenders of the faith on here and plenty of predictably overwrought responses.

Meanwhile real life goes on and I'll be meeting a bloke who has only just stopped celebrating the result of the GAA club finals at tonight's match.

[Jinxy]

I guess this would be a bad time to ask if anyone is heading to Crossmaglen to watch the Dubs this weekend.