Suncroft GFC

Suncroft is a Gaelic football club in Suncroft, County Kildare, Ireland, winner of the Senior Hurling championship in 1974 and the Senior Football League in 1952. Paul Doyle was selected on the Kildare Gaelic football team of the millennium. Anthony Rainbow was an All Stars Award winner in 2000.HistoryCurragh was one of eight teams who share the honour of being first to play Gaelic football on February 15, 1885. A club was formed in Suncroft in 1889 and in Maddenstown in 1901. Maddenstown won the junior championship in 1908, 1918 (with Paul Doyle on the team), and 1925 but amalgamated with Kildare in 1927 after the Curragh Camp affiliated. RIC records from 1890 show that Suncroft had 44 members with officers listed as Revd J Ramsbottom, Paul Cullen, Joseph Kelly and James Church. Brownstown were affiliated in 1896. Hugh Campion, Kildare GAA chairman 1972-81 came from the club.Gaelic FootballWithin a year of Suncroft reforming in 1929 they won the Junior championship and were defeated in intermediate finals in 1934 and 1937, eventually winning the 1944 and 1950 championships, progressing to win the Leader Cup in 1953. Their minors beat Sarsfields in successive minor finals in 1948 and 1949 - from that team Paddy Feeley won a Leinster medal with Kildare in 1956, Johnny Boyle an All Ireland medal with Dublin in 1958, He also captained the Kildare Minors for 3 years while Seamus Byrne played for the Irish rugby team. In 1981 Suncroft won a unique treble in under-age competitions winning under-11, 14 and 16. Anthony Rainbow was the most prominent player on a team that won the 1989 intermediate championship and reached the senior semi-final in 1995.In 2003 Suncroft lost the intermediate final to Sallins but won the Tony Keogh Cup beating Rheban. In 2007 Suncroft won the Intermediate final beating Ballymore and will now compete at senior level once more. And in 2007 Suncroft's John Brown went to Australia to play for Ireland.