PICTURES: Liam MacCarthy brings great joy to Tipperary Blue and Gold Bingo night

Golden Kilfeacle GAA club hosted a follow-up to their successful Blue and Gold bingo night.

The event was held at the Golden Kilfeacle GAA grounds last Thursday evening, and was a great success, with over 200 people showing up to play.

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The main attraction on the night was the Liam MacCarthy Cup, which was brought to the event by All-Ireland winners Oisín O’Donoghue and Johnny Ryan.

Locals had the opportunity to meet the players and have their photo taken with the cup.

Speaking at the event, Golden Kilfeacle club secretary John Currivan said he was thrilled to give something back to the loyal locals who show up every week to play, and that he was grateful to the two players who took the time to show up with the trophy: “We run the bingo every Thursday night. We have a great group of ladies and gents that come here, week in, week out, and give up their time freely for the bingo. It all goes back into helping with the running of the club and the upkeep of the facilities here.

“We’ve been doing it now the last couple of All-Irelands. It was just one night, I suppose, that someone said ‘why don’t we try a blue and gold bingo before it?’ and we said ‘okay, we’ll give a go at it,’ and we were amazed with the turnout, the amount of people that came. And then that led to us having the one after it. It’s always lovely to have the cup here, to bring it out. And you can see in there tonight, the people, they really appreciate it. They may not have a chance to get a photo with it, and they love it, so they come on with their jerseys and everything, and they get their photographs taken, and I want to say a huge thank you to Johnny Ryan and to Oisín O’Donoghue who came with us tonight, like it’s not easy for those lads, they’ve been going around I think since they won the All-Ireland. Little bit of a change for them tonight, coming in somewhere where there’s bingo books.

“But that was the idea of it, and as I say, they really appreciate it, and you can see there’s kids there tonight getting jerseys signed and everything, and it’s a terrific life, and it was a great achievement by the Tipp team and Liam Cahill and all the lads.”

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John spoke of what the Blue and Gold bingo means to the community, and how great it is to put smiles on their faces, noting that the night also managed to draw in supporters of neighbouring counties and give them a chance to also have their photo taken with the cup: “They love it in there. We’ve a great little mix in there, we’ve a few Limerick, we’ve a few Cork. Now I think a lot of them came for the photograph, especially those Cork people, we gave them the cup because they haven’t had it in a long time, and we have that great Limerick man who’s here with his green jersey, he got the photo taken too. Of course, he said he was only giving it back to us for a while. But it’s great for them, they really enjoy it. You could see there, the cheer when the lads were finishing up and leaving the hall, you know, it was really appreciated.

The weekly Golden Kilfeacle bingo provides a much-appreciated regular source of income for the club, which John said was only possible due to the unwavering support of the locals who commit to playing each week: “The bingo is huge. It’s a weekly income, which is a huge thing to have. And we do a weekly lotto as well, and that’s another huge one for us. It’s a little different to the lotto, you can give back something. People come in and they feel they have a chance of winning on the night, and they’re getting something back, and that’s what makes it.

“We’re touching 180 nearly in there every week, which is a terrific crowd to have. Now, that will go up at different times, it can spike up to over 200, but rarely goes below 175, which is huge, and as I say, it’s a great asset to us.

“We’re hoping that in 12 months time we’ll be here with the pre and post blue and gold bingo. From a Tipperary point of view, it was a brilliant year.”

John also noted that the club is getting ready to host popular Irish band The Whistlin’ Donkeys this October Bank Holiday weekend, which he is expecting to draw a huge crowd: “We have The Whistlin’ Donkeys here on Sunday night, October 26, and they’ll be on stage at 9:30pm. It’s a full bar, a full operation. We had them here last year, it was a terrific night, all went off without a hitch, and we’ll be hoping to get a great turnout again this year. They enjoyed it so much last year, they gave us the night straight away and said they’ll be back for the October Bank Holiday weekend again this year.”

Tickets for the concert can be bought online via Eventbrite.