And so it begins, again.
Only on this occasion the first day of the intercounty season will be a blend of metropolitan Manhattan and bucolic Bekan, as the New York hurlers arrive at the Air Dome to participate in the Connacht Hurling League, the 2023 intercounty season commencing with a version of international indoor hurling.
This is New York’s first time to play in the Connacht HL. Manager Richie Hartnett flies to Shannon on Saturday morning, while many of his players have been back in Ireland since pre-Christmas. The 26-strong New York squad will assemble on Monday in Bekan.
There are three games scheduled for the NUIG Connacht Air Dome on Monday – Leitrim v Mayo at 3pm, New York v Longford at 5pm and Sligo v Roscommon at 7pm, with all games being streamed on the Connacht GAA website.
In preparation for this competition, New York trained collectively up until December 22nd and since then the players have had induvial training sessions to follow.
“It’s a difficult time of the year,” says Hartnett. “But in fairness to our boys they have been doing their programmes and putting them on the WhatsApp group every day.”
Johnny Glynn would be their highest-profile hurler but the Galway man is unavailable as he recovers from knee surgery. Still, Hartnett reckons about 80 per cent of his squad have previous intercounty experience with their home counties.
The Connacht Hurling League is to be played on a quickfire basis, with the semi-finals pencilled in for Wednesday at the Air Dome. A Galway development squad await the winners of the New York-Longford game at the semi-final stages.
The final will take place on Saturday and there is also a Shield decider for the beaten semi-finalists. New York intend to be in one of those finals, but should they lose to Longford on Monday then they have back-up plans to play Athlone IT in a challenge match at the Dome on Thursday.
New York’s ultimate goal from all of this is to be granted entry to the Lory Meagher Cup.
The New York footballers have established themselves as an annual fixture on the Connacht SFC calendar and they also competed in the inaugural Tailteann Cup in 2022. Hartnett would like to see the hurlers given similar opportunities.
And that is why, for New York, this is no New Year’s jollier to the old country.
“This is a kind of stepping stone competition for us to show we can compete in the Lory Meagher ranks,” says Hartnett.
“So a lot rides on this in some ways, and depending on how we get on it could speed up or delay us getting to play in the Lory Meagher Cup. If we were to lose to Longford in that first game, maybe they are going to say ‘you still have a bit of work to do, you need to go away and come back again next year’.
“Or if we were to win this competition, it could be a case of, ‘yeah, you are ready and can come home next year for the Lory Meagher’.
“Either way, ideally, I would love to stay in the Connacht Hurling League moving forward because it would be a great warm-up competition for the likes of the Lory Meagher.”
Originally from Ballyheigue in Kerry, Hartnett is one of the driving forces behind the small ball game in the Big Apple. Ahead of his trip to Ireland, he has watched videos of Longford’s games from this year’s Lory Meagher Cup – they lost the final to Louth – but concedes it is difficult to know what kind of team they will field on Monday.
New York’s last senior hurling championship game was in 2006. They beat Derry in an Ulster semi-final at Gaelic Park in May of that year but the victory brought with it a number of logistical problems, mainly around immigration and visas, for the final against Antrim.
With concerns around re-entry to the United States, New York said they could not travel to Ireland for the game and after months of stalemate the final was eventually played in Boston that October, where Antrim won out.
But the saga had thrown the spotlight on the visa issue and New York withdrew from the Ulster Championship ahead of the 2007 competition, citing a lack of numbers due to players retiring and returning to live in Ireland.
“Over the last few years, visas haven’t been as big an issue. Of the seven teams we have in New York, we only have four lads who possibly couldn’t travel now,” says Hartnett. “We are getting to that stage where teams can travel, the footballers went over this year, seniors and juniors, so things are easier on that front.”
Eamon Fitzgerald, hurling development officer in New York, arranged a series of well attended family-friendly hurling events over the Christmas period. And there is a feeling on the ground that the optics of a senior hurling team once again representing New York can only have a positive impact, giving kids something to aspire to when they get older.
“Underage hurling has come on leaps and bounds here in the last 10 years,” says Hartnett.
On Monday, the New York senior hurlers get an opportunity to show they have too.
