Rory Grugan heads to France to coach Gaelic football in the native tongue
Armagh footballer, Rory Grugan, will spend 10 weeks in France this year coaching Gaelic football through the medium of French.
By John Harrington
Armagh footballer, Rory Grugan, will break new ground for Gaelic games by spending 10 weeks in France later this year coaching Gaelic football in clubs and schools through the medium of French.
Grugan is currently on a year long career break from his job as a French teacher in St. McCartan’s College in Monaghan and has been recruited by Gaelic Games Europe for this novel project which starts on October 14.
He’ll spend some of his time in the Gaelic games hotbed of Brittany but will also travel to Paris, Bordeaux, Toulouse, Lyon, Lille, and Strasbourg coaching players and coaches whilst also producing coaching resources in the native tongue.
“I’m really excited by the opportunity and can’t wait to get started,” Grugan told GAA.ie.
“One of my passions is teaching and the other is my GAA. To get the chance to coach in France through their native language is a challenge for me but something that I'm really looking forward to.
“It’ll be a combination of working with clubs where I’ll be coaching the kids and also doing a bit of coach development and I’ll be coaching in schools as well.
“Gaelic games is in six schools already over there and there’ll be another seven that will also benefit from this.
“I’ve seen at first hand the big growth in Gaelic games in France because in St. McCartan’s we have done an exchange trip with a school in Belley near Lyon for the past number of years.
“Last year when we were over there I went to see the Pan-European Gaelic Football Finals in Lyon and the scale of it was just mad. You just had no real ideal of how big it is over there until you see it first hand.
“There's 34 clubs now, and over 1,300 players and 90% of them are French natives so the level it’s gotten to is just crazy.
“They're really keen to grow the game and take the next step so this feels like a great opportunity.”
2,500 spectators attended the GGE Pan-European Games at the Stade de la Rabine in Vannes this year.
The idea for Grugan’s mission to France came about when Gaelic Games Europe Head of Operations, Chris Collins, visited St. McCartan’s College when the French exchange students from Belley were over.
When he discovered that Grugan was a fluent French speaker and was about to take a career break, he had a light-bulb moment.
The feedback he had been getting from France GAA was that they would really appreciate more coaching resources in their native language, so the recruitment of Grugan seemed like a great way to help tick that box while also giving the promotion of Gaelic games in France a huge boost.
“We’re thrilled that we’ve been able to get Rory on board with the help of the Gaelic Players Association and our commercial partners Kingspan and McKvr,” says Collins.
“It’s obviously an unbelievable personal development opportunity for Rory and something that can really elevate standards in France and promote the game to more French speakers.
“It happens at a great time too because Gaelic games is growing so rapidly in France.
“The French Finals were held in Brest at the at the start of July and there was 800 players at it between male and female.
“160 kids took part in the first French Youth Finals in Liffre and that competition is going to grow bigger and bigger.
“This year we partnered with Sportall to stream the All-Ireland football semi-finals and finals with French commentary for the first time ever and we had over 10,000 unique viewers which was unbelievable and shows just how much of an appetite there is for Gaelic football in France.
“Niall Burgess is the Irish ambassador in France and he's been a brilliant friend to us in terms of promoting the game and will host the Gaelic Games Europe Convention at the Irish Embassy in Paris at the end of November.
“He has also supported France GAA with an application for national recognition of Gaelic games in France as a sport. If we can get that recognition it'll unlock potential access to facilities which can sometimes be a struggle and also give clubs access to development funding for their coaches and their officers which would be huge.
“Niall is really championing that and we’re hoping to get it over the line in the next six months.
“So, there’s a lot of really good things happening in France and now Rory going over there will add to that.
“It’s really exciting from our point of view. It's the biggest initiative that Gaelic Games Europe has taken on.”
Pictured left to right at the announcement of Kingspan as Gaelic Games Europe's flagship sponsor are GGE Chairperson, John Murphy, and Irish Ambassador to France, Niall Burgess.
Grugan’s adventure will start in the biggest stronghold of Gaelic games in France, Brittany, which is a part of the world he’s already very familiar with having spent a year there as part of his undergraduate degree.
What makes Gaelic Games such an easy sell in Brittany is the fact that Bretons identify themselves as Celts.
Culturally they feel a really natural affinity with Ireland, and Gaelic Games offer a perfect sporting outlet for them to express this Celtic identity.
“Their identity is as being Breton, they feel very strongly about that,” says Grugan.
“You see all the road signs in their own Breton language. I'll always remember the first time when I was there and trying to find my feet on public transport and randomly got talking to someone and he was saying, 'oh, I'm not French, I'm Breton'.
“I didn't know at that stage about the whole Celtic roots but I got to learn about them and how proud they are of them and I think that's why Gaelic football has been strongest in that area of France.
“I’m really looking forward to travelling all over France and getting to embed myself in the community in each of the places that I'm in.
“For the few days I'm with a school or a club I'll probably be staying with some of the coaches or people involved with the club so you're really getting to experience the culture as well.
“It is nice to see the expanse of it on that big level because you're obviously in a bit of a bubble here and I have been for so many years as an inter-county player so it’ll be great to experience Gaelic games stripped back to their purest level.”
160 children took part in the French Youth Finals this year.
Gaelic Games Europe Head of Operations, Chris Collins, hopes that the pilot of this International GAA Player Exchange Programme will prove to be such a success that it will be rolled out to other countries in the coming years too.
“The unique thing about this is it's all going to be through the medium of French,” says Collins.
“Rory will be developing some of the coaching resources in French and we're going to try and film some of the activities and the drills and the skills in French so there’ll be a legacy piece in terms of resources off the back of this.
“It's the first time we've had somebody going and delivering our games internationally in the local tongue and the GPA are really excited about trying to work with us to grow that across the World GAA family by giving more players with another language the same opportunity that has been presented to Rory.”
