Gough's journey less travelled to All Ireland final

“I’d like to think that Ireland has moved on as a community. That the fans have moved on as a community.”

The words of Slane man David Gough in an Off The Ball interview in 2017 when asked in he thought being a GAA player was a barrier to coming out as a gay man.
Everyone had their own journey to make, and their own path to find that journey, he added.
Certainly, he has followed the road less travelled to the announcement that he was to referee the 2019 All Ireland Senior Football Final between Kerry and Dublin, which may be history making in more ways than one.
Back in March 2015, in the midst of the Marriage Equality Referendum, Gough, a member of the GAA’s elite panel of inter-county referees, wanted to wear a ‘freedom’ wristband to highlight equality and homophobia in sport, and as a personal gesture of support for a ‘yes’ vote.
He had received permission to wear the wristband at the Dublin and Tyrone national league clash at Croke Park.
But he was then told that the GAA does not allow political statements and wearing the “gay pride” or “freedom” wristband, made up of six differently coloured stripes and signifying diversity in the gay community, breached that rule.
The GAA said that once the referendum on same-sex civil marriage had been called then the issue “became political.”
The Slane club footballer and primary school teacher in Templeogue had made his intentions to wear the wristband known to his school principal, as well as GAA referees’ chief Patrick Doherty.
In the Off The Ball interview, Gough recounted how he first came out to his family and friends over a period of weeks in January 2011.
He had probably realised he was gay around the time he left college at the age of 22, he said, but it took him another six years to deal with it.
“It’s really difficult to explain to people who have never gone through it,” he said.
“You have this inbuilt fear that you are letting people down, that you are ashamed of who you are, you think people are going to see you and treat you differently.”
But, he added, this is not the case.
“As soon as you take that step into the unknown, the weight that is taken off you is huge.”
He had thrown himself into sport to take his mind off it, and the 45 minute drive from Dublin to Slane for training was when he would feel it worst, when it felt “like a belt around your chest”.
After school one day, when the teacher sat down to pick a reading for his aunt’s humanist wedding, and read a poem by John O’Donohue, ‘For the Time of Necessary Decision’ he knew it was time he had to make that leap into the unknown, make his own necessary decision.
It was the perception in his own mind of what others might think that had prevented him from doing so, and the perception in the changing rooms. He had 
even stopped playing for a while over it.
Those weeks in January 2011 were quite an emotional couple of weeks not only for him but all close to him, but he has happy and fond memories of those few weeks, he said.

 

David Gough gets good wishes this week from fellow clubman, Cllr Wayne Harding, cathaoirleach, Meath County Council, and Nicky Tallon and Peter Mooney of Slane GFC.

There was a different type of furore surrounding David Gough’s appointment to referee this year’s All Ireland, which led to the Kerry manager Peter Keane describing him as ‘best referee in the country’ and the obvious choice to referee the All-Ireland final.
Because Gough works in Dublin, and would know and meet Dublin players, former Kerry manager Éamonn Fitzmaurice and former player Kieran Donaghy raised questions over the 36 year-old’s suitability to take charge of the game between the capital and the kingdom.
But on Radio Kerry, the chairman of Kerry GAA, Tim Murphy, said: “From our perspective, we have complete confidence in the process and the integrity of the people who make the appointment of David Gough, and in him refereeing the final. These people have decided he is the best person, most experienced, and we respect that.
“It is important to stress the team management has no issue with David Gough as All-Ireland referee. Absolutely. He would be seen as one of the most experienced in the country. It is the first time in four years we are in a final, Kerry is a proud football county and we always do our talking on the field. It is a huge occasion for us, for this team that was in its infancy at the start of the season. And it’s a huge occasion for the referee.”
In this year’s football championship, Gough has refereed the All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Quarter-Finals between Mayo and Donegal, and Dublin and Cork, Ulster Semi Final Donegal v Tyrone, and Mayo v Roscommon in Connacht Championship. In the Allianz League, he has refereed the Kerry v Tyrone, Down v Westmeath, Cavan v Roscommon and Cork v Donegal.