THE LAST POINT: Shouting stop just the first step

For those of a certain vintage, John Healy is a name that resonates deeply as an author and a journalist of repute but over the past week, the famed Mayo scribe has been introduced to a new audience as the GAA launched their ground-breaking Demographics Report “No One Shouted Stop - Until Now - The GAA's response to Ireland's Demographic Shift”.

The images of Healy weeping tears of joy after David O'Leary's penalty beat Romania at Italia 90 regularly gets an outing on RTE's Reeling in the Years, the  political commentator crying his eyes out  as celebrations all around him took place at the Summit that signalled the end of Ireland's Presidency of the EU - the image summing up how the country felt just then.

But Healy was most famous for his seminal tome “No One Shouted Stop (The Death of an Irish Town)”, published in 1968, a book that catalogued the decline of Charlestown as a town. It was a familiar theme all over the western seaboard as emigration and rural depopulation threatened the very existence of local communities.

It seems almost impossible to believe now but the late 60s, 70s and 80s were a dire and dismal time for this country - we talk about the travails of the present as something unprecedented but those decades saw hundreds of thousands of young Irish people exported to  all corners of the globe, never to return, with economic woes, unemployment rife and seemingly no hope or no future along the western seaboard.

The population imbalance that exists today was just as stark  - Leitrim's population in 1971 stood at 28,360 but 25 years later,  before the start of the Celtic Tiger, it was down to 25,057. Now, the guts of 30 years later, the county's population stands at 35,199, a jump of almost 40% but much of that figure is misleading as the county's population explosion came in five or six areas and the rest of the county are struggling for numbers.

THE LAST POINT: COMMODIFICATION OF SPORT IS A WORRY

Dublin accounted 28.6% of the Republic's  population back in 1971 and ironically, that figure is now lower at  just over 28.3% but, with over 2.1 million extra people in the country and most of them along the eastern seaboard, statistics may say one thing but the reality is vastly different! And that's without adding  the explosion of population in Kildare, Wicklow, Meath, Louth into the mix while  Westmeath, Cavan, Carlow, Laois and parts of Wexford have seen their populations go up through the roof.

Truth be told, I haven't fully read the report the GAA issued last Thursday, I'd want a good bit of time to do that, but  anyone paying attention to these pages over the last few years or the utterances of Declan Bohan and Enda Stenson at various County Board Conventions would more than aware of the problems facing not only the GAA, but all sporting organisations and society in general in the county.

In lots of ways, Leitrim stands as a microcosm of the problem - the county's population has exploded but many areas are struggling for numbers. Carrick-on-Shannon could stand in for Dublin, the biggest population but also with scant recreational facilities and, thanks to the price of land and housing, developing sporting facilities  around the area seems like an impossibility.

It is no coincidence that, along with the long awaited Shannonside Recreational Campus, the clubs of  Carrick Town FC, St Mary's Kiltoghert and Carrick on Shannon Rugby Club are all  developing their own  facilities to cope with the numbers now wanting to join their clubs. Waiting lists to join various clubs, including the athletics, swimming and gymnastics clubs, speak of a sporting infrastructure groaning under the weight of the numbers now in the area.

That might seem like first world problems if you don't have the numbers but   I'm sure if you talked to anyone in Dromahair or Kinlough, they'd have the same story to tell and, as much as a population explosion is  welcomed, oftentimes communities are unable to cope with the flood of people coming into an area

For others, it is a different story - post offices and shops are closing down, schools are getting smaller and might even  face the chop while  teams playing on the field are getting older and older. It is the other side of the coin that faces the booming areas, a repeat of the malaise that saw some clubs go under in the past and leaves you wondering where we are heading.

Somebody posted on X that Leitrim has the highest percentage of players per county population with 15% - the male figure of 17% was the highest of the entire country while the female 13% was joint highest with Cavan. I'm not sure where the figures came from and if they are accurate but  as  proud as Leitrim people should be of those statistics, it also reveals an uncomfortable reality.

Leitrim's 15% represents almost 5,280 people but Dublin, with just four percent of their population as GAA players, can still call on over 58,300 players across male and female - meaning that Dublin's 4% brings them over ten times the amount of players for their clubs and county to choose from. And for all the talk of super clubs in Dublin, the concentration of population  in Leitrim means we have the same potential of 'super clubs' here.  

The big take away is that while raw numbers can tell a story, it is what we do with those numbers that will influence how our communities, sporting and cultural,  fare in the years to come - in fairness, the GAA Demographic Committee have suggestions; laying out strategies and initiatives on facilities, targeted interventions in urban centres and areas with declining populations along with the targeted growth of new clubs as well as new bye-laws that might allow dual eligibility for players in urban clubs with links to rural clubs.   

THE LAST POINT: CONNACHT DAYS ONE TO SAVOUR

The most eye-catching proposal was holding modified games programmes where clubs are struggling to field 15 players by holding blitzes or 9 & 11-a-side competition or creating regional competitions - a proposal that has been made more than once in this county in the past.

Credit the GAA - they have certainly shouted stop, loudly, and it is a cry for help that could help countless communities, and even other sporting organisations, if rural areas can retain their population but  the hard work is only starting. Right now, it is not beyond the realms of possibility to suggest that Aughawillan, Drumreilly and Aughnasheelin might amalgamate at Senior level just as they do at Juvenile level.

I'm not singling out those three clubs, there are a few that face the same dilemma,  but I know from talking to officials from all three that the idea of amalgamations will be fiercely and bitterly resisted such in their justified pride in their own clubs. But, in their quiet moments, they  acknowledge that it might be inevitable and that is the challenge facing the GAA.

Shouting stop and highlighting the dire straits rural clubs find themselves in is a ground-breaking moment, worthy of the highest praise, but  the work is only just beginning for rural communities, particularly in the west of Ireland, to keep their clubs alive.