Russell Gaelic Union, Downpatrick is a

Gaelic football Gaelic football ( ga, Peil Ghaelach; short name '), commonly known as simply Gaelic, GAA or Football is an Irish team sport. It is played between two teams of 15 players on a rectangular grass pitch. The objective of the sport is to score by kic ...

and ladies' Gaelic football club based in Downpatrick,

County Down County Down () is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. It covers an area of and has a population of 531,665. It borders County Antrim to the ...

, Northern Ireland.

History

The Club House at the Thomas Russell Park GAA Club - geograph

The first Gaelic Athletic Association club in Downpatrick was founded in 1896, ''Clan Na Gael'', mostly a

hurling Hurling ( ga, iománaíocht, ') is an outdoor team game of ancient Gaelic Irish origin, played by men. One of Ireland's native Gaelic games, it shares a number of features with Gaelic football, such as the field and goals, the number of p ...

team.

began to be popular in the 1910s. The games were outlawed during the

Irish War of Independence The Irish War of Independence () or Anglo-Irish War was a guerrilla war fought in Ireland from 1919 to 1921 between the Irish Republican Army (IRA, the army of the Irish Republic) and British forces: the British Army, along with the quasi-mil ...

(1918–22), but teams were refounded in 1924 and the ''St Patrick'' club affiliated in 1926. Downpatrick won their first Down Senior Football Championship in 1935. In 1938–39 they moved to Leatham's field at Ballymote and renamed themselves ''The Thomas Russell Club'', after Thomas Russell (1767–1803), executed at Downpatrick for his role in the Irish rebellion of 1803. Players were harassed by policemen of the

Royal Ulster Constabulary The Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) was the police force in Northern Ireland from 1922 to 2001. It was founded on 1 June 1922 as a successor to the Royal Irish Constabulary (RIC)Richard Doherty, ''The Thin Green Line – The History of the Royal ...

, who uprooted their goalposts and sent officers to their games to intimidate them. In 1949 they became the ''Russell Gaelic Union''. Russell Gaelic Union won further county titles in 1972 and 1978 In the 1990s the team experienced great success both at a team level with RGU Downpatrick and more widely on the

Down Down most often refers to: * Down, the relative direction opposed to up * Down (gridiron football), in American/Canadian football, a period when one play takes place * Down feather, a soft bird feather used in bedding and clothing * Downland, a ty ...

county team. Downpatrick won three county titles in four years, and reached the final of the 1993 Ulster Senior Club Football Championship, losing to Errigal Ciarán. A ladies' team was founded in 1997. In 2015 the club's grounds on Old Course Road were named as Down's second grounds (after

Páirc Esler Páirc Esler ( , ; also ga, Páirc an Iúir ) is a GAA stadium in Newry, County Down, Northern Ireland. It is the home of the Down Gaelic football and hurling teams and the Newry Shamrocks GAA club. The ground has a capacity of about 20,000. ...

in Newry) and received £10,000 in funding from Down District Council. RGU Downpatrick attracted some minor controversial press comment in 2018 when a brawl broke out at a league match against Ballyholland Harps. Both clubs were banned from the 2019 championship.

Honours

Gaelic football

* Down Senior Football Championship (6): 1935, 1972, 1978, 1990, 1991, 1993 *Down Intermediate Football Championship (1): 2005 *Down Junior Football Championship (2): 1961, 1984 *Down Minor Football Championship (7): 1961, 1962, 1969, 1971, 1972, 1976, 1983

Hurling

*Down Junior Hurling Championship (1): 1945

References

External links

Official page
Gaelic games clubs in County Down Gaelic football clubs in County Down {{Ulster-GAA-club-stub