GAELIC SPORTS WORLD Issue 18 – January 24, 2015 | Page 8

Photo: Warwickshire GAA ball. In the All Ireland Junior Football Club Championship, John Mitchels GAA of Liverpool (senior team), last November defeated Aran Islands and now face Moate All Whites from County Westmeath at Pairc Tailteann in County Meath on Sunday with the Liverpool side slight favourites with the bookies. Also in action this Sunday will be London senior hurling champions Kilburn Gaels. The Gaels impressed when defeating Kilkenny’s intermediate champions Mullinavat in December to make the All Ireland Intermediate club semi-final where they will meet County Galway’s Cappataggle. Kilburn Gaels are packed with quality players and are odds on to make the final. Yet a further British GAA club is doing battle this weekend also this time in Dublin when Manchester’s Fullen Gaels take on Castleblayney from County Monaghan in the All Ireland Junior Club semi-final. Fullen Gaels are the reigning All-Britain Junior Hurling champions and are the hot fancies to take victory over Castleblayney. So, it promises to be a very big weekend for British clubs. 8 BRITISH COUNTIES Leaving aside London for the moment the other six British GAA ‘counties’ of Warwickshire Gloucestershire, Hertfordshire, Lancashire, Yorkshire and Scotland all have full annual competition calendars. Warwickshire has 16 GAA clubs and in the past in both football and hurling have seen teams reach and win All Ireland junior titles. Warwickshire Hurling team competes in the National League Level 3B in Ireland and this year will play County Longford on March 1st. This will be a tough-ask first game since Longford were demoted from 3A last year, but later won the Lory Meagher Cup, dishing out a heavy defeat to the English side in the process. Warwickshire will have it all to do. Warwickshire Football team did well last year in making the 2014 All-Britain Junior Football Championship where they were narrowly defeated by Scotland in the final. They had good victories against Gloucestershire and County Kilkenny, who are allowed in this event, and should feature once more in 2015.