America's hurling messiah

There was a really interesting article published in the sleaziest tabloid of them all, the Sunday Independent, yesterday. It's great to see some recognition for Dave Olson and the work of the Milwaukee Hurling Club. Let's hope the GAA can put some more faith in the international aspect of the game which is growing thanks to the great work of people like Dave and others in Europe, Australia and Asia. Promotion the game among locals is the key to the success of these games abroad. The New York County Board needs to take on board the work done here and follow suit instead of allowing clubs to pay for county players from Ireland to fly over to the US taking them out of competitions that they think they are too good for such as the Christy Ring Cup and the Nicky Rackard Cup. If they were too good for those competitions they wouldn't have been knocked out the Championship. The NAGAA along with the GAA needs to enforce some rules minimising the amount of transfers or better still enforce a quota on local citizens in each jurisdiction i.e. US citizens in the NAGAA, UK citizens in Britain and especially London and so on.

Not to maintain a negative slant only here the GAA have made great strides in recent years in recognising the importance and significance of the game internationally. Not only will new flair and skills be brought to the game, it will benefit from immensely, but it is something that needs to happen. The monotony of the Leinster Hurling Championship for example where Kilkenny are in a spell of domination and the Leinster Council are considering holding it outside of Croke Park, is one reason to generate new teams worldwide who can compete eventually at the highest level. Another reason to promote the game internationally is the increased immigrant population in Ireland. As these people develop skills in Gaelic Games shouldn't they have somewhere to take them should they decide to return home?

Just one final point on the article, it was an article on Hurling but independent.ie have included it in 'Other Sports'.