A little All-Ireland stardust sets Sweden on a new course

By Philip O'Connor

The young lad bends his knees and brings the hurl down close to the ground, eyes fixed on the sliotar rolling towards him. He rolls the bas over the slowing sliotar, lifting it into the air before breaking into a jog and a broad smile. A few steps later he taps it to the waiting coach, six-time All-Ireland hurling champion Seán Finn.

Less than an hour beforehand, the 13-year-old, born and raised in the Swedish city of Gävle about 90 minutes north of Stockholm, had never even heard of hurling.

An hour later at a nearby restaurant, Limerick hurler Finn waxed lyrical about the picture-perfect roll-lift and pass and the Swedish students who had been introduced to Gaelic games earlier in the afternoon by some Irish household names.

Among them were Galway All Ireland-winning camóg and warrior queen Áine Keane, fellow Galwegian John Divilly (a Sam Maguire winner in 1998), and Dublin boss Ger Brennan, a man with almost as many GAA medals as he has anecdotes about Gaelic games.

The foursome were in Sweden as part of a sports diplomacy initiative organised by the Irish Embassy in Stockholm, and though Finn flew home after a brief visit to answer the call of his club, the rest were put through their paces in a packed few days, with coaching sessions, panel discussions and meetings all intended to help map the future of Gaelic games in Sweden and the wider Nordic region.

It’s a place that is both thriving and challenging, and I should know – I started the Stockholm Gaels together with Colin Courtney back in 2009, with Swede Anna Rönngård coming in to power the women’s team, and in the last few years hurling and camogie have been catching up on the big ball game.

With hundreds of Irish people working on big Swedish construction projects, from data centres to pharmaceutical factories, the games are in rude health, but there is another step that needs to be taken.

Irish communities and GAA clubs all over the world are different. Some are mature, well-resourced and long-established in their host countries. Others pop up and burn brightly for a few years, the flame flickering and dying when the Irish there move on.

For two decades, the games have flourished in the Nordic region, with some incredible football championships and hurling establishing a real foothold in Finland, but that success has been driven by players running clubs for players, rather than any great joint strategic vision. The seeds of success have been sown and the shoots are spreading, but the roots are not yet deep enough to survive the harsh winters, and every spring the clubs must begin anew.

Led by Ambassador Barbara Jones in Stockholm and supported by sponsors Kirby and Collen who are deeply involved in huge construction projects in the region, those roots are now being tended to and nurtured in a serious and methodical way.

Key to these efforts is Derryman Chris Collins, a world-class plate-spinner, coach and firefighter tasked with growing the games in a wildly differing European landscape as Gaelic Games Europe's Head of Operations.

For those of us who put our shoulders to the wheel to build the Nordic GAA scene, the diplomatic effort and the added impetus from the GAA is a hugely welcome addition. The gravitas brought by the weight of the state opens doors for us, getting people in the room from the city councils in Stockholm and Gävle that we would otherwise struggle to access.

The ambassador’s skilled steering of discussions is focused not on what we want or need (though all of those things are important), but on what we have to offer the places we now call home.

And what can we offer? Great games that everyone is welcome to play, community and camaraderie, and a sense of belonging. With our games come our culture and craic, our mastery of English and our grá for the Gaeilge, our music and our literature and a desire to make ourselves a part of wherever we are.

In Gävle and Stockholm over three days, the Embassy opened up a whole new world to us. Members of Djurgårdens IF, one of the city’s oldest and most successful sporting institutions, came to talk to our guests from Ireland and representatives from the Stockholm Gaels, and officials from the city and the Ministry for Social Affairs were also in attendance. Vera-Linn Lanängen from LGBTQ+ sports organisation All Stripes came to ask if she and her members would be welcome, and the answer was a resounding yes.

For those for whom the GAA experience has been entirely on the island of Ireland, it can be hard to understand how the games are run abroad; suffice to say it’s often a completely different experience from what happens at home, but our clubs are no less important to our communities.

When we started in Stockholm, we had half-a-dozen lads kicking a size 5 at a pair of American football posts on a bumpy pitch; from that grew a club and a culture and a community that has endured and served us well.

The posts we aimed at are long gone, but the club remains, and thanks to the engagement from the Embassy and from Gaelic Games Europe, we are ready to take the next step and put down the roots that will anchor us here for generations to come.

I used to say that the future of Gaelic games lay with people whose names we don’t yet know, but that’s no longer true; we’ve learned a good few of them over the last few days, and no doubt there’ll be more to come in the near future.

With fistfuls of All-Ireland medals between them, Seán, Áine, John and Ger brought a little bit of stardust to Sweden; their achievements are a glimpse of what is possible when communities dream big dreams and then pull together to make them come true.

We have long dreamed of a time when our games are firmly rooted in Sweden, the place we call home; we’re not there yet, but the foundations are being laid.

Now, the real work begins.