1939 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Explained

Year:	1939
Team:	Kerry
Titles:	13th
Team2:	Meath
Leinster:	Meath
Munster:	Kerry
Ulster:	Cavan
Connacht:	Mayo
Next:	1940
Teams:	26

The 1939 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship was the 53rd staging of Ireland's premier Gaelic football knock-out competition. Galway entered the championship as defending champions; however, they were beaten by Mayo in the Connacht final. Kerry were the winners.^{[1] [2] [3]}

Format

Provincial Championships format changes

Leinster Championship format change

2 Preliminary rounds instead of usual 1. Involved were Longford, Carlow, Westmeath & Wicklow of course the winners qualified for a quarterfinal to meet the stronger teams.

Munster Championship format change

In 1939 Kerry were given a bye to the Munster final, preliminary round was just a lone match between Cork vs Waterford, the winners of the game played in the quarterfinals along with Tipperary, Limerick and Clare, the winners of the game played in a lone Semifinal. The format was previously used in 1933 and was used again in 1941.

All Ireland semifinals system

The All-Ireland Senior Football Championship was run on a provincial basis as usual in every 3rd year in rotation, with the four winners from Connacht, Leinster, Munster and Ulster advancing to the All-Ireland semi-finals. The draw for these games was as follows:

• Munster V. Connacht
• Ulster V. Leinster

Provincial championships

Connacht Senior Football Championship

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Leinster Senior Football Championship

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Munster Senior Football Championship

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Ulster Senior Football Championship

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See main article: 1939 All-Ireland Senior Football Championship Final.

Championship statistics

Miscellaneous

• Meath win their second Leinster Title first since 1895.
• Kerry are now one behind Dublin with All Ireland titles.
• There were a number of first-time championship meetings; There were 2 first time championship meetings in the All Ireland Series at first in the semifinal stage a first meeting between Meath vs Cavan while the second was All Ireland final was the first championship meeting of Kerry vs Meath.

Notes and References

1. Web site: Football Results 1911 - 1940 | the Official Website of the GAA . 2011-07-22 . https://web.archive.org/web/20120321030358/http://gaaweb.sitesuite.cn/page/football_results_1911_1940.html . 2012-03-21 . dead .
2. Web site: Archived copy . 2011-07-22 . https://web.archive.org/web/20110716104405/http://hoganstand.com/general/champs/honoursf.aspx . 2011-07-16 . dead .
3. Web site: Archived copy . 2011-09-28 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20110928061017/http://leinster.gaa.ie/archive/pdf/P130_134_Senior_FootChamp.pdf . 2011-09-28 .