Connacht GAA Director of Hurling Damien Curley. Photo by Diarmuid Greene/Sportsfile
By Cian O’Connell
Damien Curley’s passion for hurling remains undiminished. An All-Ireland club winner with Kiltormer in 1992, Curley enjoyed a fine playing career.
As a coach and administrator, Curley has contributed too. Being involved at senior inter-county level, Curley witnessed class players delivering under pressure.
For a couple of decades, Curley kept GMIT (now ATU Galway) relevant. Sometimes it was demanding due to restricted numbers compared to other colleges, but there was always pride in the jersey.
That sense of place and belonging matters deeply in Curley’s new role as Connacht GAA Hurling Director. Damien Coleman was a significant influence in the role previously, and Curley hopes to build on the solid foundations already established. “It is an effort in continuing the work that has been done,” Curley remarks.
Galway compete on the national stage, while crucial work has been carried out elsewhere in the west. “You've pockets in each of the Connacht counties where there is massive interest in hurling,” he adds.
“People have a real dedicated interest and genuine belief that they can spread the gospel.
“You've great work going on in Mayo and Sligo, similarly Roscommon have huge potential to rise again, and Leitrim, while it is a small county, you still have pockets where you've really dedicated people. They are mad to keep hurling going.”
In recent months Curley has been busy planning and plotting for the future. It has been an important spell, to simply assess the current landscape with a view to trying to make progress. “Initially, we are very much in the planning phase,” he explains.
“That is something we're doing, I'm sitting down with Cathal Cregg and some of the other officers in the Connacht, we are trying to put together something that we might be able to roll out from 2025 to 2028 that will help and improve all of the counties.
“So, we've spent the last couple of months putting it together, it is due to be presented to Connacht Council officers over the next few days.
Mayo's Seán Regan in action against Donegal in the 2024 Nickey Rackard Cup Final at Croke Park. Photo by Ray McManus/Sportsfile
“We will probably go on the road to meet the different Coaching & Games and hurling committees in each of the different counties to see can we drive this on.”
Curley is eager to develop the game further. “Our ultimate aim is that we'd be able to provide a hurling club within 20 minutes of a kid’s area.
“In places like Mayo, where they have up to 10 clubs at the moment, which is brilliant, there is a good opportunity for a kid from a perceived football area in Mayo. They have an opportunity to join a hurling club, if they so wish.
“We want to try to get that in place in Leitrim and Roscommon. North Roscommon wouldn't be a hotbed of hurling, but if we got a cluster of football clubs with people interested in hurling, we might develop that idea.
“It isn't really one facet, it is an amalgamation of a lot of things. The schools have to come into it, the clubs, development squads, and ultimately the aim is to try to grow the game in clubs, to try to have a good fixtures programme for them.”
Challenges existed. Increasing participation at juvenile and adult level is one part of the brief. Another is to increase the standards at inter-county level. “Some of the counties in the competitions, they've yo-yoed a little bit,” Curley reflects.
“They are capable of winning a Nickey Rackard, getting up to Christy Ring level, but we want them to hold their place in that. In a lot of circumstances, they've gone up, but they've also come down within a year or two.
“It is about trying to get the counties to a level where they have enough players coming through, that they can sustain themselves at the highest level they can be at. That is the key to it.
“While coming down is grand, maybe you win the competition below, and it gives an opportunity to start from scratch to build upwards. Ultimately, we'd like to see the counties playing at the top level they can play at, whatever that is. When they get to that stage, we want them to sustain it, to hold there, to try to be progressing upwards again.
“If we could get those teams to Joe McDonagh level, I think that'd be a massive achievement for the short term. To hold their place at a level is definitely one of the priorities.”
Micheál Hussey, Roscommon, and Tiernan Connolly, Down, in action during the All-Ireland U20B Championship Richie McElligott Cup final at Croke Park in Dublin. Photo by Ray McManus/Sportsfile
A collaborative approach is key. Clubs and continues must work together to enhance the offering. Curley is optimistic. “We are all realists,” Curley says. “Each of the Connacht counties outside of Galway would be perceived as football strong areas. We fully appreciate that.
“The last thing we want to be doing is cutting in, saying our sport is the number one sport. While hurling is a brilliant game, we want to provide the opportunities for kids to play everything they can play, to get a taste of everything.
“The collaborative idea is massively important, we need everybody coming on board with this. We can't be seen as a sport coming in to take over days in the fixtures programme, stuff like that.
“Football and other sports fixtures have to be fitted in, we have to be cognisant of all of that. We really need everybody working together to make this any kind of a success.”
Already, Curley is tweaking his own approach slightly. “It is looking at it, seeing it from a different perspective,” he says. “When you're involved in Galway, you are at a pretty elite level where the club game and county game is really, really strong. That mightn't be the case, particularly with fixtures in some of the other counties.”
At GMIT as a manager of teams Curley watched hurlers evolve and improve. “Through the third level lens, you'd have seen some of the kids coming in from those counties; probably, they felt when they arrived in college in Galway that they were mixing with other really good hurlers, but maybe they mightn't be good enough,” he adds.
“Our experience was over the years, where guys committed and got involved in panels, they were certainly well able to hold their own.
“You've a couple of instances of that over the years where fellas played Fitzgibbon with us from Mayo, Sligo, and Roscommon, in particular. They'd have grown in that environment.”
So, Curley has learned many lessons during his sporting life. “The lens I'm looking at now is to try to merge everything together,” he says.
“That we can make it something kids, in particular, would like to try out and that we can provide a platform for them to join a club, to play hurling competitively, to help them progress in their careers.”
