Information
St. Brendan's Gaelic Football Club was founded in 2001 and named after the Patron Saint of County Kerry, Ireland. Stephen O'Shea, formerly from County Kerry, had a dream to start a Gaelic Football club for the children of his community. Thanks to him and eight other founding members who joined this venture to serve the youth of their Orange County communities. Stephen's dream began taking shape and the due diligence necessary to secure a home playing field commenced. Through the assistance and support of the visionary Town Board members from the neighboring town of Blooming Grove, St. Brendan's soon had a pitch to call home located within Gonzaga Park at 379 Seven Springs Mountain Road in Monroe.
In 2013, the club reached another wonderful milestone. Through the collaboration of Aiden Mahoney and Rob Ronayne the clubs first hurling teams took to the field, elevating the organization to Gaelic Athletic Association status.
Today, large numbers of energetic youth continue to sign on to play, filling teams in all age groups in both Gaelic Football & Hurling. St. Brendan's GAA is so very thankful to the tenacious founding members, phenomenal coaches, remarkable volunteers, generous sponsors, and dedicated players and their parents ~ because of all of you, our amazing club grows and flourishes each year, always seeking and welcoming new members.
History of the Club
Gaelic football is a fast and exciting field game unique to Ireland. It can be described as a mixture of soccer and rugby, but is a lot older. It is a field game which has developed as a distinct game similar to the progression of Australian Rules.
There are 15 players on a team and the object is to kick, hand-pass or fist a leather ball through to the opponents goal, into the net as in soccer to score three points or to put it over a crossbar for one point. Each game lasts for 70 minutes with two halves of 35 minutes each.
The ball used in Gaelic Football is round, slightly smaller than a soccer ball. It can be carried in the hand for a distance of four steps and can be kicked or "hand-passed", a striking motion with the hand or fist. After every four steps the ball must be either bounced or "solo-ed", an action of dropping the ball onto the foot and kicking it back into the hand. You may not bounce the ball twice in a row.
Each team consists of 15 players, lining out as follows:
1 goalkeeper
3 full-backs
3 half-backs
2 midfielders
3 half-forwards and
3 full-forwards
A goal is signaled with an umpire to the left of the goal raising a green flag A point is signaled by raising a white flag to the right of goal. A '45'/'65' is signaled by the umpire raising his/her outside arm. A 'square ball', when a player scores having arrived in the 'square' prior to receiving the ball, is signaled by pointing at the small parallelogram.
Gaelic football as played today is a modern, fast and enjoyable sport. Almost 2,600 clubs promote the game and there are branches of the Gaelic Athletic Association in England, Scotland, USA, Canada, Australia, parts of Asia and in most countries in Europe.
The game is played in 3,500 primary schools and this is where most players make their first contact with the game.
How to Play
