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JOB done on the pitch – much work to do to secure a new pitch. A new home. A real home - one of their own. Now in their late 20s, St Brigid’s are desperate to change from being renters to owner-occupiers. Musgrave Park, Belfast City Council property, has been good for St Brigid’s, and they for it – but the south Belfast club has long outgrown that base on Stockman’s Lane. Don’t be fooled by that quaint, country-sounding name. That ‘Lane’ is a major, four-lane road, with the roundabout at one end leading to the M1 and also Kennedy Way, heading up into west Belfast. The other end goes up Balmoral Avenue to the busy Lisburn and Malone Roads. The opposite side of the ‘Lane’ has the Boucher Road, with all its shopping malls and industrial estates. Even if St Brigid’s were able to own Musgrave Park, as they have tried to do, it’s far from an ideal site for development given all the traffic and existing aspects of its surroundings. Yet as club chairman Eunan Conway says: “We badly, badly, badly do need extra playing space to cater for the growing needs, the needs of the population in south Belfast.” The aim is to move to a nearby site at Upper Malone. On Sunday St Gall’s senior footballers made the short journey from their home in the west of the city. The Milltown men were the kings of Antrim football for the first decade, and more, of this century. Kings of Ulster twice (and finalists twice more), then High Kings of All-Ireland too on St Patrick’s Day 2010, having been pipped in the 2006 national decider. However, they haven’t won Antrim since 2014, nor reached a final for a decade. St Brigid’s would love just to do the latter, though. Current champions Dunloy edged them by the minimum margin in last year’s quarter-finals and the south Belfast men reached the semi-finals in both 2023 and 2024, again defeated by the eventual winners, Cargin, on both occasions. A three-point loss to the Toomebridge team in their Group 3 opener seemed a serious setback to St Brigid’s hopes of even reaching this year’s quarter-finals. Yet they responded in style, recovering from the concession of an odd early goal to beat St Gall’s comfortably, 1-21 to 1-10. Another win on Sunday September 6, at the neutral venue of Ahoghill against Moneyglass will take St Brigid’s into the last eight. Given that the St Ergnat’s side have lost both their matches, both by 12-point margins, then St Brigid’s can look forward to another quarter-final appearance with some confidence. There’s also optimism about their new home project, following two “positive” public consultations during June. “We have another few weeks to go on the issue,” said Conway. “We had public consultation at Queen’s for two dates. It didn’t throw up anything that we weren’t expecting. “We have ecological surveys we need to do. We have car parking issues that we need to resolve. “We had our local Belfast City councillors here [at Musgrave Park] showing how we handle some of the traffic management issues. “We’re able to avail of the hospital here. We are able to avail of a private sector provider here beside us and the council has two car parks here and we need to show the same innovative approach with Lagan Park and we hope to be able to do that to allay any potential fears that we have.” What matters most to a GAA club, of course, are the games. St Brigid’s have plenty of those – almost too many. “Our issue here today,” relays Conway, “is we had ‘GAA for All’ on at 9.30am. We had under-14 football on. We had two minor football matches on. “We have a senior football match on now. We have a senior camogie match on and we badly, badly, badly do need extra playing space to cater for the growing needs, the needs of the population in south Belfast.” Given that Musgrave Park is in public ownership, charging for admission to matches is an added complication. Even though St Brigid’s would hope to have work underway on their new home by the time the club turns 30, in 2028, they’re still planning further development at Musgrave Park. Standing outside their clubhouse, Conway pointed across the pitch and explained: “The agreement we have for the 15-year extension to our lease is that we’re going to move the fence at the far side back and we hope to be able to have our own little space where we can be able to do something with it - but it is a problem. “We can’t charge into the inner area and not for the other thing as it’s a public space. “We don’t want to upset any dog walkers or anything else; we work in unison with them and partnership with them. “In fact we work hand-in-hand with a ‘fun run’ that takes place here at half nine on a Sunday morning. So it’s not to replace, it’s to augment and help develop activity of sport and nature in the city.” Conway kindly spoke to me after breaking away from chatting to two men who have put some money into the club: “I’m just hosting some of our sponsors here. We’re lucky we have a lot of very generous sponsors who provided this pitch-side advertising on a three-year basis. “It’s another small step in the right direction. We’re working with the private sector in order to showcase our games, which can only be a positive thing. “We invited some of our sponsors here, for some of them this is their first time at a Gaelic game, and that can only be good in order to develop relationships.”