The South Australia GAA season culminated with the SA GAA Grand
Finals yesterday at St Mary’s Park outside Adelaide, marking the end of a
stellar Championship.
The day kicked off with a Junior GAA Academy exhibition game,
which was followed by a highly entertaining Hurling demonstration game which
proved to be a worthy curtain raiser to the Gaelic Football Finals.
First up, the Ladies Final between great rivals Irish
Australian Blues and Onkaparingal was an extremely close encounter. Irish
Australian Blues had to fight all the way to defeat a determined Onkaparinga
team by just one point (1-10 to 2-06).
This was followed by the Men’s Final, which was another closely
fought and highly entertaining game, where two goals in the second half
determined the outcome. St Brendan’s prevailed on the day to claim the Hannigan
cup with a score of 2-09 to 0-09.
Channel 7 was also on hand to broadcast the festivities.
For GAA in South Australia, the 2014/15 season saw an
increase in the number of both Men’s and Ladies Football teams as well as the
re-introduction of Hurling in the state, for the first time since 1990.
Despite the high temperatures, the GAA season in Adelaide
runs over the Summer months enabling local AFL players to take up the sport
during their off-season. All teams involved in the competition are predominately
made up of Australian born players.
