The Yorkshire County Board of the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA), known as Yorkshire GAA, is one of the county boards of the GAA outside Ireland, and is responsible for Gaelic games in Yorkshire and North East England. The county board is also responsible for the Yorkshire county teams. With Hertfordshire, Gloucestershire, Lancashire, London, Scotland, and Warwickshire, the board makes up the British Provincial Board.
History Gaelic games have been played in Yorkshire as early as the 1940s, with clubs being established by Irish immigrants travelling to Britain to find work. The Yorkshire County Board was established in 1948, with several clubs being formed in Leeds around the same time.
In 1987, Mayo and Dublin played a football challenge match at Elland Road in front of a crowd of 5000 spectators, with a second Elland Road match being played in 1988 between Mayo and Galway.
The ladies’ football scene in Yorkshire officially began in 1988 with the formation of the Pennine League between clubs in Lancashire and Yorkshire. A Pennine county team was formed in the same year, and in 1989, Pennine and London became the founding members of Britain LGFA. While Lancashire would become its own county board in the 1990s, Yorkshire LGFA was founded in 2018, with the ladies’ county team winning the LGFA Championship in the same year. The Pennine League continues to be played between the Lancashire and Yorkshire ladies’ clubs, with separate county championships also existing in the two counties.
Football
Clubs Club nameTeamsLocationPitch Brothers PearseMen's - Senior Ladies' - Junior HuddersfieldNew Hey Road Cú Chulainns / Tír na nÓgMen's - Senior (Cú Chulainns) Ladies' - Junior (Tír na nÓg)NewcastleKillingworth Hugh O'Neills Men's - Senior Ladies' - Junior LeedsPairc Beeston John F Kennedys Men's - SeniorLeeds St Benedicts Harps Men's - SeniorLeeds St VincentsMen's - Senior Ladies' - Junior SheffieldNorton Sports Park York IrishTrainingYork
Yorkshire Men's Senior Football Championship winners
2015 Hugh O'Neils 2016 St Benedicts Harps 2017 Hugh O'Neills 2018 Cu Chulainns 2019 Hugh O'Neills 2020 Hugh O'Neills 2021 St Vincents 2022 Brothers Pearse 2023 Hugh O'Neills 2024 Hugh O'Neills 2025 Hugh O'Neills 2026 St Vincents
Yorkshire Ladies' Junior Football Championship winners
2018 Tír na nÓg 2019 Tír na nÓg 2020 not played 2021 Tír na nÓg 2022 Hugh O'Neills 2023 Brothers Pearse 2024 Hugh O'Neills 2025 Hugh O'Neills 2026 St Vincents
County team Yorkshire fields a men's county team in the All-Britain Junior Football Championship and a ladies' county team in the Britain LGFA Junior Championship. The Yorkshire men have not won the All-Britain since the tournament was restructured in 2022, and so have not yet competed in the new format of the All-Ireland Junior Football Championship.
Honours
Men's All-Ireland Junior Football Championship Runners-Up (2): 1961, 1983 All-Britain Junior Football Championship Winners (4): 1961, 1983, 1996, 2001 Ladies' All-Britain Ladies' Football Championship Winners: 2018
Hurling and camogie Clubs As Yorkshire's sole hurling team, Yorkshire Emeralds currently compete in the Lancashire county championship system. There are no active camogie teams within Yorkshire. Club nameTeamsLocationPitch Yorkshire EmeraldsHurling LeedsPairc Beeston
Honours Yorkshire Emeralds
Lancashire SHC: Runners-Up (2): 2025, 2026
County team Yorkshire has never competed in the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship.
References
External links Official Provincial Council of Britain GAA website