South Roscommon stalwart receives GAA President's Award
A South Roscommon GAA stalwart was honoured at the weekend at the annual GAA President’s Awards at Croke Park.
Joe Moore of St Aidan’s GAA was selected as the Connacht winner at the prestigious annual awards, known as Gradaim an Uachtaráin 2026, which took place on Friday night.
The awards, organised with the support of AIB and broadcast by TG4, were presented by GAA President Jarlath Burns, to acknowledge individuals who have made an extraordinary contribution to the promotion of Gaelic games at club and county level.
The citation for Joe Moore read, as follows:
From the St. Aidans GAA Club in Roscommon, it’s no understatement to say that the sporting lives of the people of Dysart, Ballyforan and Four Roads parish wouldn’t be the same without the influence of Joe Moore.
It wasn’t until the 1960s that St. Aidan’s GAA club was properly established. Though founded in 1956, it took time for the various corners of the parish to gel together. At 15 years of age, Joe played adult championship for St. Aidan’s in 1959, but the club didn’t field a team again until 1963, his first year out of minor. By then, he was club secretary and involved in running the team as well.
Joe was renowned for travelling to the various national schools around the parish and dropping postcards for each family in order to run parish leagues in Dysart, then in turn ensuring those same young players continued to play football with St. Aidan’s. The sight of Joe bringing young players to matches on his bike, or later on, in his car, was commonplace.
The bones of Joe’s 1962 minor team stuck together, aided by a handful of older players, and a junior championship win in 1966, with Moore lining out at right wing forward, proved to be a vital steppingstone in cementing the whole operation.
Every positive step that the club has taken has either been driven by Joe or benefited from his involvement. He was central to the fundraising drive and the work involved in putting in a new pitch at the club grounds in Ballyforan while he was playing, and since then, the club has added floodlighting, a walking track, a gym, community meeting room, four dressing rooms and a second training pitch, and is currently aiming to put in an astroturf training area around the ball wall.
Perhaps most importantly of all, in a parish that has a strong tradition of hurling (through Four Roads HC) and handball (through Mount Talbot club),
Joe has always encouraged young players to be involved in all sports and supported them in doing so, to the point that he was also involved in basketball coaching, among other activities. This is a central part of the sporting identity of the people of this parish, and it has been fostered in no small part by the work that he put in to make this community what it is today.”
Running for more than 20 years, the awards are a cross-section of people who have stood out through their ability to consistently go above and beyond in the service of their club and county and GAA community.
There are provincial, educational, and Irish language awards, as well as awards recognising contributions made to Ladies football, Camogie, World GAA, and Handball.
Speaking at the event, Uachtarán CLG Jarlath Burns said: “The GAA cannot function without the incredible work of the volunteer army that makes us the extraordinary movement that we have been since 1884. The people being honoured are in their own way ambassadors for the many thousands like them who make the GAA what it is. I congratulate all of our worthy recipients and wish to acknowledge the support of TG4 and AIB for this scheme.”
Joe was one of two local winners, with Kevin Jordan of Southern Gaels being honoured with the Leinster award.