GAA Interprovincial Championship
The GAA Interprovincial Championship (Irish: An Corn Idir-Chúigeach) or Railway Cup (Corn an Iarnróid) is the name of two annual Gaelic football and hurling competitions held between the provinces of Ireland. The Munster, Leinster, Connacht and Ulster teams are composed of the best players from the various counties in the province. The series of games is organised by the Gaelic Athletic Association.
The Railway Cup was a revival of the Railway Shield. The Railway Shield ran from 1905 to 1907 (Football) and from 1905 to 1908 (Hurling). Any team that retained the shield was deemed to have won it outright. Munster secured two-in-a-row in football in 1907 and took permanent possession of the trophy. Leinster emulated this feat in hurling in 1908.
The first Railway Cup competitions (the name is due to the donation of the trophy by Irish Rail) were held in 1927, with Munster winning the first football title and Leinster winning the first hurling title. Presently, Ulster hold the record for the most football Railway Cup wins with 30, while Munster has won the most hurling titles with 43. The longest hurling streak was Munster's six-in-a-row from 1948 to 1953, while Ulster won a football five-in-a-row from 1991 to 1995. The Railway Cup has gone into severe decline in recent years. Some blame the GAA for this decline due to the low level of promotion given and the lack of a fixed date to be played each year. The finals, held on Saint Patrick's Day, attracted huge crowds in the 1950s and 1960s, however, by the 1990s attendances at the once prestigious competition had reduced to only a few hundred. The All-Ireland Club Finals have superseded them in popularity and have taken over the Saint Patrick's Day fixture in Croke Park. Since 2001 the tournament has been sponsored and promoted by Clare businessman Martin Donnelly and a resurgence in popularity has occurred. In 2005 the winners were Munster in hurling and Leinster in football.
