Success of London's Gaelic football team in All Ireland championship a remarkable reflection of country's emigration culture London players and supporters celebrate victory over Leitrim and qualification for the Connacht final. Picture: gaa.ie ON Sunday night AEST, Londons Gaelic football team  known as the Exiles  will march in the pre-match parade before taking on Mayo, last years beaten All Ireland finalists, in a provincial final. It's a scenario nobody on the island of Ireland would have predicted just a few weeks ago, before London beat Sligo and Leitrim on the way to guaranteeing their greatest ever summer. They now even have their own theme song, a re-imagining of The Clash's London Calling that might deserve the faint praise of being a cut above most sport-related novelty songs, but is still likely to have the late, great Joe Strummer spinning like a top. Teams representing London and New York play in the Connacht Gaelic football championship (essentially a western conference) every year, filling out the numbers in a province with the least amount of county teams and the most amount of emigration. Traditionally, the exile "counties" have provided little more than easybeats in what usually amounts to an exhibition game, allowing Irish emigrants to enjoy a live game in proximity to their home away from home. New York continues to fulfil the role of cannon fodder in football, although its hurling team did pull off a seismic shock in the 2007 Ulster hurling championship, when it beat Derry to progress to the provincial final. However, due to the residency status of a significant number of its squad, it was unable to leave the US to play the match in Ireland. After much administrative manoeuvring, it was eventually beaten by Antrim. In Boston. Meanwhile, in recent years London's football team has been scaring the big guns, who were suddenly finding themselves scrambling for last-minute scores to beat their less-fancied opponents. The Exiles" cause has inevitably been helped by an injection of playing talent in the wake of Ireland's economic collapse in 2008. After more than a decade of riding the "Celtic Tiger" economy, the collapse of an insanely inflated property market and a disastrous bank guarantee pushed the nation close to ruin. With youth unemployment skyrocketing, the default setting for Ireland's young - like multiple generations before them - was to seek greener pastures elsewhere. A culture of emigration has been ingrained in Ireland since the Famine of the mid-18th century, when the country's population was decimated. A not so fun fact: Ireland is the only state or territory on earth that has less people in it now than it did 200 years ago. So it's strangely fitting that in the year of "The Gathering," a state-sponsored celebration of the Irish diaspora and rallying call to bring them home (if only to visit), that a team of exiles booked their return tickets while so clearly showcasing the economic situation's drain on the country's best and brightest. One local Gaelic football team in county Mayo went as far as to post online a graphic showing an entire team they should be fielding in their competition, with flags beside each of the 15 names showing the country they're now living in. London and New York may have been the traditional destinations for Irish emigrants down the years, but it's arguable that Australian cities could soon field credible Gaelic football teams if distance and costs weren't so prohibitive. London's success this year came about after they were placed on the weaker side of the provincial draw, but remains an astonishing achievement. While Gaelic games are strictly amateur - despite drawing AFL-esque crowds to showpiece games - there is an enormous gap between the Haves and the Have-nots. Some teams can afford to implement a professional set-up and backroom team, and training demands and expectations are the equal of almost any professional field sport in the world, despite all players requiring a day job to survive. London - who play just one championship game per season at home, regardless of success - cannot afford such structures, and are further hamstrung by the tyranny of travel across the city, making just getting to training an epic quest for a large number of players in the squad. Their opposition on Sunday night are firmly in the "Haves" list, despite losing potential star player Pearce Hanley to AFL success at the Brisbane Lions. Mayo are in most pundits" Top 5 list of contenders for All Ireland glory and you'd have to risk $500 with one bookie to make a dollar's profit on them winning. The bookies rarely lie, and the chances of a London win are remote at best, but whatever happens, they are in the final 12 of the All Ireland championship with a team of players who don't live in the only country that plays the sport. It's a remarkable, albeit bittersweet, accomplishment