Mount Sion GAA Club
Mount Sion GAA Club is based not on a parish or an area, but on a people…a people in love with a game called hurling. Founded in 1932, it has become Waterford’s most successful hurling club, in fact one of the top and most respected hurling clubs in the country.
The club grew out of Mount Sion Christian Brothers’ School in the centre of Waterford City. Hurling was strong and vibrant in the school from 1915 onwards. The Christian Brothers Believed that a new club was required which would cater for the young teenage hurlers of the school and for its past pupils. So Cnoc Sion / Mount Sion GAA club was founded in 1932, bearing the name of the school and wearing its colours of royal blue and white.
Success followed immediately as the new club one the County Minor Hurling Championship in the following years 1933 and ’34, an indication surely that the hurling potential was there. The first adult title came in ’34 when Sion won the County Junior Hurling Crown. The club won its first County Senior title in 1938, and 60 years later in 1998, Mount Sion won its 30th County Senior Hurling title; a record not achieved by any other GAA club in Ireland, 30 senior titles in 60 years. In the year 2000 the club won its 31st Senior Hurling title.
Mount Sion and Faughs of Dublin both with 31 County Senior Hurling titles, hold the national record for S.H. title won. The club has won 4 Senior Football titles, 7 under-21 Hurling title and 26 Minor Hurling titles, plus numerous other various grades.
The 10 year period from 1991 onwards, was the clubs most successful decade across the different age groups, as is clearly evident from the following range of County Titles won; 3 at Under-14 hurling, 1 under-14 football, 3 under-16 hurling, 6 at minor hurling, 4 at under-21 hurling, 1 junior football and 3 at senior hurling, plus numerous titles at under-11, under-12 and under-13 all at division one level in hurling. Very few clubs can match Sion’s success story of the nineties.
Large numbers of Mount Sion hurlers progress annually from wearing the blue and white of Sion to the white and blue of Waterford. Seldom has a Waterford hurling team taken to the field without a Mount Sion man on the board. Since its foundation seven decades ago, Sion has provided leadership and inspiration to Waterford on the hurling fields of Ireland.
Club Grounds and Facilities
The club acquired it’s own grounds in 1950. From 1932 to 1950 it had the use of Walsh Park for training and it was shared as a training base with its greatest city rival on the inter-club hurling scene, Erin’s Own.
Both the club and the school leased 14 acres from Waterford Corporation at Rathfadden. Over the years the property has been developed and today Mount Sion GAA Club is proud to possess a top class playing pitch, plus a training area with modern floodlights, 2 top class modern dressing-rooms as well as a splendid and spacious Club Social Centre with its own car park.
The first Club Social Centre was officially opened on August 4th 1974. It was replaced twenty years later in ’94, by a new ultra modern Club Social Centre. It was opened in December ’95 and is clearly a vote confidence in the future of Mount Sion and its people.
The school playing grounds, comprising of three playing pitches and four dressing-rooms, are situated adjacent to the club grounds and Social Centre. The playing pitches, which are of different sizes, are utilised to the full by Mount Sion Primary and Secondary Schools and the GAA Club. The playing surface of the pitches is of top quality. All age groups are catered for in Hurling, Gaelic Football, Camogie and Ladies Gaelic Football.
The club and the schools at Mount Sion have always worked in partnership and in harmony for the promotion and development of Gaelic Games among the youth.
Bro. C. Griffey