Neil MacManus at the launch of the Bord Gáis Energy GAA Legends Tour Series of Croke Park for 2024. After over a decade of partnership the Bord Gáis Energy Legends Tour Series of Croke Park returns once again for 2024 and includes a star-studded line up of Gaelic Games players. For a full schedule of the Bord Gáis Energy GAA Legends Tour Series of Croke Park and details of how to book a place on a tour, visit crokepark.ie/legends. Booking is essential as the tours sell out quickly.
By John Harrington
In a way, Neil McManus is a child of The Troubles.
He grew up in Cushendall on the North Coast of Antrim, but his family is originally from a mainly Protestant area of Belfast
Such were the intimidatory times, they were among thousands of Catholics who felt they had no option other than to leave their homes or risk the wrath of neighbours who didn’t want them there.
So, in the dead of night, his Grandfather packed all their belongings in his fruit and veg van and pointed it north towards Cushendall which they knew from time spent there on summer holidays.
Neil’s father Hugh was also in the back of the van, and was destined to find love in Cushendall with Neil’s mother Dorothy.
His family tree might branch into some darker days of Irish history, but McManus wants to live in a country of light rather than shadow.
He sees no good in division and believes the GAA can be a positive force for all communities rather than regarded as the preserve of one.
“As one of our top economists, David McWilliams, often says, 'demography is destiny', and he's right,” said McManus at the launch of the Bord Gáis Energy Legends Tour of Croke Park series.
“In the north, half of our populations or thereabouts are not playing our sports. What a crying shame that is.
“It’s going to be a long-term project but there's no reason why in 50 years we couldn't be talking about teams from predominantly unionist areas playing our sports and getting enjoyment out of it and getting the same value from it that our communities are seeing from the GAA at the minute. Why not?
“There's much more that unites us than divides us in the north. We all love our sports, it's just we need to be able to share those sports with each other and probably be a little bit more honest with each other in terms of what our Associations are about.
“If you're just open and honest, people can understand it better. No cloak and dagger stuff, here's what our Association is about. Show what the community benefit is of the GAA and say, look, this can be the case for your community where they're maybe struggling for a community ethos. There's huge lessons that we can all learn from each other.”
Antrim hurler Neil McManus and his father Hugh at Cushendall GAA Club in Antrim. Neil is an ambassador for the GAA Community Heart Programme which seeks to raise awareness of the benefits of defibrillators to clubs and make it possible to fundraise to acquire them. Neil's work is inspired by his family experience five years ago when his father was saved by the presence of a defibrillator in the community during an emergency. GAA club-based defibrillators have been used to save 42 lives. For more information see: https://savealife.communityheartprogram.com/gaa. Photo by David Fitzgerald/Sportsfile
It’s not so long ago that the thought of Gaelic games uniting nationalist and unionist communities in a common cause would have been fanciful in the extreme, but once frozen views have thawed somewhat.
The Northern Ireland Assembly is finally back up and running, and McManus believes it’s now time the GAA put its shoulder to a door that has cracked open.
“We're watching the interaction between Emma Little-Pengelly and Michelle O'Neill and we're seeing how those two leaders are trying to bring people together and I think they're doing it really well,” he says.
“I also think we have the best ambassador possible for the GAA as Uachtarán now in Jarlath Burns and I think it's really timely because there's a great opportunity at this moment.
“Jarlath obviously attended that women's international in Windsor Park and how he leads and how he articulates what our Association is, and he did it on William Crawley's Talk Back show last week, is the perfect illustration of our Association.”
It’s that picture of an inclusive GAA that McManus himself also makes a point of painting whenever he meets people from the Unionist community.
“Any time I interact with someone from the Unionist community I evangelise for the GAA,” he says.
“I'm lucky to be meeting lads who are maybe Ulster rugby players or former rugby or hockey internationals and I always evangelise about the GAA to them and they get it.
“How we go a step further and bring in people who consider themselves from the loyalist community will be a much tougher endeavour. But I think that the road is open to talk to people in the middle ground who are Unionist but who know that history started before the early 1920s and we are the same people but only half of the people are getting to play these sports.
“We will have to do a lot of work in all different areas of society to unite the people of the north first and talk openly about what reunification would look like. Is that somewhere you'd be comfortable? How would you be comfortable? What would have to be the set-up? Have those open, honest, adult conversations and let's see a bit of each other's culture.”
Neil McManus of Ruairi Óg, Cushendall, centre, is presented with his AIB GAA Club Hurling Team of the Year Award by AIB Head of Marketing Engagement Nuala Kroondijk and Uachtarán Chumann Lúthchleas Gael Jarlath Burns during the AIB GAA Club Players Awards, held at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Sam Barnes/Sportsfile.
People might come from different cultures, but McManus believes we’re all united by a love of community and want to live in communities where we feel like we’re valued and part of a collective that strives to improve one another’s lives.
This is why he’s confident that if Unionists are welcomed in to the GAA with open arms they’ll quickly see there’s a happy, fulfilling home there for them too.
“I got to schools regularly that are in Unionist areas and talk to them about what the GAA has given to me and what it gives to my community on a daily basis,” he says.
“There's always shock at what this amateur Association has given. The two biggest indicators of a wholesome life are purpose and connection. We're part of an Association that gives us both in the area that we're from.
“If you outline what you do for the GAA for free as a club-member, people think you're nuts, but therein lies the beauty. Because we're all doing it. Whenever you explain that to people, that's the key.
“We're not giving away our time, we're giving it to each other. Whenever people come around and they understand it, then they realise that you've something much better than professional sport.
“There genuinely is a place for everybody in the GAA. There's a part for us all to play. That fact of getting more out than you put in is always true of the GAA.
“We get to be part of a community that supports us in all sorts of ways. That looks after our children, that helps people get education, that helps people get jobs, that helps people in our community develop resilience.
“In Cushendall we're a far cry from the nearest hospital and we're a far cry from the emergency services, so through the GAA we have set ourselves up as a resilient community. We have our first responders for medical emergencies.
“We have a flood response team. We have 4x4 responders who can take food and supplies from the pharmacy to elderly people. All this stuff happens through the GAA. What a resource! I fail to see the negative and it's for everybody in our community.
“There are Protestant members of our community but they're just members of our community. They're no more or less special than any of the rest of us. And that's happening all over Ireland, Cushendall is just a good representation of it.”