GAELIC SPORTS WORLD Issue 29 – July 4, 2015 | Page 11

den, who themselves recently introduced hurling to the city, a Berlin/
Cologne combo team, another new
entity Bavaria and the all German
newcomers, Darmstadt GAA.
It was an historic moment as Darmstadt side is the first entirely nonIrish team to play in the European
Hurling championships.
Ahead of the tournament, the excitement of the players was evident
Feldmann told Gaelic Sports World.
Photo courtesy of Jacob Feldmann.
“We are definitely excited! For all of
us this is the first hurling tournament
EVER! Most never even attended one as a visitor,” he said.
The team was eager to learn from each game at the tournament and make improvements where they could.
“Yet, we don’t know what to expect and if the level of our
performance will match with the other teams, we put all
“Immediately after each game we talked about the way
concerns aside and try to make the best of it. After all to
the other team played. We analysed how our opponents
be there and play is the best experience and exercise we
played, how much we had to offer against them and what
could get.”
we could change,” enthused Feldmann.

Most of the players had experience of training at the
university but with some only having actually started
playing just this semester with three months of playing
practice.
REACTION AND FUTURE

Darmstadt did very well as an all German team coming
in fourth place in the event behind, Dresden in third, Viking Gaels in second and winners Belgium. The Darmstadt side made the semi-finals where they lost heavily
to Belgium and then lost 3/4TH playoff game to Dresden. However, they did win their very first game against
Berlin/Cologne by 4-1 to 2-2, a great achievement for
the all German hurling team.

Others at the tournament were impressed at the newcomers play and Feldmann was taken aback at the reaction.
“We were surprised by the interest we got as an All-German team. The feedback was throughout positive and constructive. I remember the sentence - “we didn’t even know
you guys existed or where Darmstadt is but now you come
here and play proper Hurling. And none of you is Irish”.
‘Proper’ or not, as others might like to call it, Darmstadt
were playing Hurling, and putting on a good show.
“To be honest we were also surprised by our own performance, the challenge really helped us to overcome
our limitations,” noted the club’s chairperson. Feldmann
thinks the tournament was an important step for the

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