John Mitchel's Hurling Club

Infobox GAA overseas club
club gaa = John Mitchel's
irish =
crest =
founded =1933
county = Warwickshire
division =
nickname =
colours = Red with white hoop grounds =
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leftarm=FFFFFF |body=FFFFFF |rightarm=FFFFFF |shorts=FFFFFF |socks=FFFFFF
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John Mitchel's Hurling club along with its Gaelic football club is the oldest club in the Warwickshire GAA. Formed over 70 years ago it has continually been one of the standard bearers in the county in both hurling and football.

History

The John Mitchel’s Gaelic Athletic Association Club was formed in 1933 around the same time as the Warwickshire County Board. In fact, they supplied pitches and playing kit to the county which is how the Warwickshire hurlers came to have a white strip!

In the early years the club had such great Gaels as Paddy Ryan from Pallasgreen, Co. Limerick and Mick Ryan from County Laois at the helm. In the forties, the club was dominant in all competitions. Then in the sixties, John Mitchel’s built what was arguably their best ever team - they reached their peak in 1971 winning the Warwickshire championship and the getting through to the Championship of Britain final. Here they faced the mighty Brian Boru’s in New Eltham.

This Brian’s team featured no less than 10 London senior players that had played in the Munster championship. Such greats included Johnny Barrett, Timmy Sheehan, Roger Cashin, Paddy McGrath, Patsy O’Neill, Pat McDermott, Martin Connolly (RIP) and Tom Connolly.

The Mitchels had many stars of their own with many fine hurlers such as Billy Collins(RIP), Jimmy Moynihan (RIP), Paddy Grimes, Liam Dalton and Ritchie Walsh, to name but a few. They beat the Brian’s in what turned out to be a fine game of hurling, no quarter asked or given, a fight to the end.

Reformed Club - 1990

Amazingly, a few years later, the John Mitchel’s hurling club folded due to lack of players. But in 1990, the club was reformed by Tom O Brien, Tom Healy, Jimmy Moynihan (RIP) and Billy Collins (RIP), amongst others and by 1991 they had regained the Warwickshire Senior Hurling crown. Soon afterwards Frank, Larry and Anne Healy along with Martin Gannon (RIP) started an underage set up in the club. This was a huge undertaking comprising a lot of hard work, but which was rewarded in Ruislip in 2004 when the club beat London GAA champions Bros Pearse to win the club championship of Britain. More than thirty years after that famous victory in New Eltham the club had again claimed a British championship and this time went onto the All Ireland club quarter final losing out by a point.

A great hurler with the team in their glory days was Billy Collins (RIP) from Limerick, who remained until his death in 2008 heavily involved in the club and Warwickshire hurling. Billy went on to become chairman of the County Board, a post he held for over 25 years.

He also did a lot of hard work on Pairc na Éireann, the counties ground, to ensure it was able to host top fixtures. Billy’s son, Michael, has been a tremendous worker for the club and county over the last number of years and was very involved in the management side of the county team in the Nicky Rackard Cup and Leinster league. Great work has been done by everyone there to bring this once great club back from extinction.John Mitchel's regained the club championship of Britain crown in 2007 once again against Bros Pearse in Ruislip after an exciting drawn game in Parc n'Heirran.

External links

*http://mitchelshurling.intheteam.com