Our clubs have famous faces fighting their corner
IT was the question I’d been itching for years to ask Jamie Dornan, the millionaire star of the Fifty Shades ofgreymovie,buttheanswer I wanted was about a hue of blue — and yellow — which were the colours of an Irish League football club.
Therumourwasthatthe Holywood-born actor was a supporter of Bangor FC who are hardly the most glamorous football team in the world.
I first heard the claim when, with my actor’s hat on, I was filming a scene for The Fall which was the locally produced TV drama that made Jamie a star.
An actor who was playing opposite me told me that Jamie was always banging on about Bangor but it wasn’t until a few years later after a press conference that I was able to quiz him about the Seasiders.
And yes, he said he was a Bangor fan, adding that his father Jim, the well-known obstetrician and gynaecologist, had been a director of the club and that’s what triggered his interest.
His dad later told me that he and Jamie were ‘big fans’ of the club.
At the time of my conversation with Jamie, Bangor were playing in the Ballymena Intermediate League and he admitted that he wasn’t as up to date with their exploits as he once was.
Butthere’s no doubting Cold Feet star James Nesbitt’s passion for his team, Coleraine. He’s not only a fan but also a financial backer.
And Jimmy (above, with Dornan) knows his club inside out. The first time I met him, in the upstairs bar of the Europa Hotel, our lengthy chat was almost exclusively about his team and the team I supported, Linfield.
We reminisced about great games and legendary players like Johnny Mccurdy, Dessie Dickson, Phil Scott and Sammy Pavis.
Another actor with a penchant for Irish League football is Oscar-nominated Sir Kenneth Branagh.
Iwasscepticalofthetalk that he’d been a Linfield fan in his youth until I read an interview from 2000 in The Observer newspaper in which he confirmed his early love for the Blues and for Tottenham Hotspur. But the Irish League really doeshaveasurprisingly high numberofcelebrities among its supporters ranks past and present.
Cliftonville in particular have a long list of celebrity fans. A couple of years ago Eamonn Holmes was photographed at a game at Solitude whichisnearwherehewas raised.
UTV’S political editor Ken Reid has been a lifelong fan as has journalist Henry Mcdonald who even managed to write the Reds into a novel called Two Souls which centred on the 1979 Irish Cup Final that
Cliftonville won after beating Portadown 3-2.
May Mcfettridge is another Cliftonville fan though ‘she’ goes to Solitude in her real life guise of John Linehan.
Give My Head Peace star Tim Mcgarry’s fervour for Cliftonville isn’t surprising. His uncle Dr Kevin Mcgarry was a stalwart of the club on and off the park.
Musicians Cormac Neeson from The Answer, who are based in England, said he still looks out for Cliftonville’s results every week and Davy Mclarnon from 70s punk band Shock Treatment is often at Solitude as are broadcaster Joe Lindsay, boxer Paddy Barnes and hairdresser Paul Stafford.
Crusaders may not have the Irish League’s biggest supporters base but boxer Carl Framptonensuresthattheypunch well above their weight when it comes to famous fans.
The former BBC Ireland correspondent Denis Murray has also had a long affection for the north Belfast side.
And ex-stiff Little Fingers musician Henry Cluney once wrote a song for Crusaders, The Hatchetmen are Back.
In his line of work former Presbyterian Moderator, the Rev Kenneth Newell, mightn’t like to be dubbed a Hatchetman but that’s what he is while another high profile man of the cloth, the ex-methodist President the Rev Jim Rea, lends his support on a Saturday to Dundela Football Club.
Less than a mile away at the Oval, Glentoran enjoy an impressive who’s who of famous fans including the former First Minister Peter Robinson.
The late PUP leader David Ervine watched the Glens’ home games from the same spot behind the goals at the Oval but one of his successors,
Billy Hutchinson, is a Linfield fan.
Earlier this year singer Van Morrison revealed in an interview for the first time that his father George was a Glenman who took his son to the Oval for games.
It was the same story with George Best who as a youngster was often by the side of his father Dickie at the Oval.
Rock musician Ricky Warwick is a passionate Glenman and regularly plays benefit gigs for the club when he’s home from his base in America, and radio presenter Rigsy, real name David O’reilly, also supports the east Belfast side.
Even though he’s also from the east of the city Colin Murray went over to the other side, so to speak, to support Linfield and was once apparently captured by the TV cameras celebrating a League title win by the Blues.
Ex-radio Five Live football commentator Alan Green was always destined to be a Blueman taking his cue from his fanatical father Billy who said in a video about his team that ‘there’s the Lord, there’s my family and there’s Linfield’.
The story goes that during one commentary on a European game in England, Alan read out a score flash about a heavy loss by Glentoran on the continent.
“That’ll make my dad happy,” he said.
In his autobiography The Green Line, Alan denied persistent claims that he supported Liverpool and insisted his only team were Linfield.
I’ve been following Linfield a lifetime and I was for five years the co-editor of the club match-day programme (and the Northern Ireland one) before making that aforementioned
video about the history of the Blues.
In public, former Belfast Telegraph sports editor Malcolm Brodie had to plough a neutral furrow in his coverage of the Irish League. But he would confess to a like-minded soul like me that his heart really lay at what he called the ‘Shrine’ — Windsor Park.
Linfield’s manager David Healy was a youthful supporter of the Blues as well in his hometown of Killyleagh and David Jeffrey who was one of his predecessors in the Windsor hot-seat was a fan too.
Another ex-linfield manager and player Eric Bowyer still watches the Blues most weeks.
A number of Northern Ireland politicians are seen regularly at Irish League grounds though cynical fans have accused some of them of playing for votes. One leading Unionist showed up at a game not long before an election and had to ask his host which colour ‘his’ team played in.
But the credentials of former Unionist leader Tom Elliott as a supporter of Championship team Ballinamallard United are impeccable.
He goes everywhere and anywhere to watch his team and has even found time to be club chairman and edit the club’s programme.
Like Ballinamallard another side who boomerang between the Premiership and the Championship are Carrick Rangers.
Sky Sports’ fast rising sports presenter Paul Gilmour makes no secret of his affection for the Taylor’s Avenue club.
Not far away at the Sky Blues, Ballymena United number the BBC’S political correspondent Stephen Walker among their most devoted supporters.
But veteran broadcaster Jackie Fullerton is undoubtedly United’s most renowned fan.
In January 2018 during a live post-match interview on the telly Jackie forgot himself and his supposed impartiality by saying to United boss David Jeffrey that a win over Glenavon meant ‘WE’RE in the top six.
As well as Jimmy Nesbitt, Ballymena’s fiercest rivals Coleraine can also count on the support of actor Alan Mckee and broadcaster Alan Simpson who is the club’s match day announcer.
Staying with television, one of the top and most mimicked political reporters on national TV, the late John Cole of the BBC, grew up in Belfast as a Distillery supporter. Former Irish League side Derry City who now ply their trade in the League of Ireland have no shortage of illustrious fans including political activist Eamonn Mccann and band The Undertones who featured the team on record covers.
The late Martin Mcguinness, Gerry Anderson and Bishop Edward Daly were also regulars at the Brandywell and Dr Who actor David Tennant was filmed for a TV show wearing a red and white scarf at the Brandywell after he discovered that his grandfather Archie Mcleod played for Derry and married a local girl Nellie Blair.
However one of the most unusual claims about an Irish League ‘fan’ was ruled offside.
Hollywood actress Demi Moore was seen wearing a sweatshirt with the name Linfield emblazoned on it in the film Indecent Proposal sending male pulses racing at Windsor Park until it was pointed out that her top was actually from Linfield College in Oregon.