“I know I am different; but just in this way.” I remember exactly where I was when I read this line in Donal Óg Cusack’s 2009 autobiography Come What May, as the Cork hurler became the first elite Irish sportsperson to publicly come out. It was a groundbreaking moment. Queer athletes were no longer an abstract in our country; this made them real.
Many may have expected the floodgates to open – but change came in a much more subtle form. Five years on, when St. Vincent’s captain Ger Brennan stood in the Hogan Stand of Croke Park and lifted the 2014 All Ireland Club Championship, acknowledging the “girlfriends and boyfriends” of the players in his victory speech, it was a casual mention that meant so much to so many.