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Field of Green Dreams

IRISH EYES will be smiling a little wider come Saturday. For that is when St. John Central’s nomadic football program comes home.

The Fighting Irish will play its first-ever “true” home football game this Saturday at noon. The Green will welcome the Cameron Dragons to its new digs in south Bellaire.

The game will be the culmination of countless years of vision, labor, money, commitment and faith.

In its storied football history, the Fighting Irish have called Bellaire’s Nelson Field and Bridgeport’s Perkins Field as their primary home fields. But St. John’s has also been known to play “home” games at Shadyside’s Fleming Field, Wheeling Island Stadium and St. Clairsville.

Such will no longer be the case. Rather than bouncing from stadium to stadium, the Fighting Irish will now have the luxury of playing several games a year on their own field.

The new complex reflects the spirit and determination of the Irish Nation. St. John’s partisans have harbored dreams of their own football field for many decades. Those aspirations began to see substantive gains seven years ago.

Irish Youth Sports was formed and took the field idea and ran with it. The Paolina Family proved a driving force in the project, both financially and with hands-on work.

IYS struck a leasing deal with the village of Bellaire, bought additional land and spent thousands of hours transforming it into a complex the Fighting Irish faithful will embrace with unbridled pride.

We tip our helmets to the St. John Central community on its realization of a dream.

It truly is Home, Sweet, Home!

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