QUEEN FOR A DAY
How an OKC woman became the darling of Glentoran soccer fans in Ireland
How did a 33- year-old woman from Oklahoma City end up being the honorary queen of soccer fans in Belfast? It's a story that involves an inadvertent tweet, a soccer match 15 years ago and chicken emojis.
Morgan Day works f or BigWing, a digital marketing agency in Oklahoma City, and has a Twitter handle of @morganday. Every April 23 in east Belfast the fans of the Glentoran Football Club, a traditional power in Ireland, celebrate their own “Morgan Day” to remember a huge win.
To understand the importance of “Morgan Day” in Belfast you have to understand the intense rivalry between Glen to ran, a team in east Belfast, and Linfield, a team in
south Belfast, said Alan White of Edmond.
White is a Glentoran fan who grew up in east Belfast. He moved to Oklahoma City in 1995 to play soccer for coach Brian Harvey and Oklahoma City University and describes the Glentoran-Linfield animosity as OU-Texas times 20.
“They cannot stand each other. The hatred is immense,” White said. “Both sets of fans are typically very working class. Most of Glentoran's fans have worked in the shipyard where the Titanic was built. It is a very blue collar working team. Most of Linfield's fans are in south Belfast and kind of the same.”
Glentoran vs. Linfield is considered one of the top five soccer rivalries in the world. When they play each other, the fans are segregated with a block of empty seats in between, a section called No Man's Land, to ensure that no Glentoran and Linfield supporters have to sit next to each other, White said. A line of police officers guard No Man's
Land to keep the peace, he said.
The two clubs play each other at l east twice every season, but the April 23, 2005, game was the only time between the rivals where the outcome would decide the league title. Chris Morgan of Glentoran FC, who used to play for Linfield, scored the winning goal in the final minute and chaos ensued with fans storming the field.
“Everybody went nuts,”
White said.
Thus, “Morgan Day” was born in Belfast and is still celebrated 15 years later, as Oklahoma City's real-life Morgan Day learned via Twitter.
It began on April 23 when a Glentoran fan tagged @morganday in a tweet wishing her a happy “Morgan Day.”
“I got that one and I thought
that's weird,” Day said. “By the fourth one I was like, this is obviously like something big.”
She knew it had something to do with soccer from the photos in the tweets. She also knew it had something to do with chickens because of the chicken emojis in them. Glentoran fans affectionately refer to their team as the “Wee Cock and Hens.”
Day, who has attended a few Energy FC games in Oklahoma City but admits being only a casual sports fan, decided to have some fun with it. She replied with her own tweet about how something big in sports must have happened 15 years ago, how it might have had something to do with a chicken,
and how internet strangers have decided she was their queen.
From there, it snowballed. For the next few hours, she was getting dozens of notifications every minute on Twitter from Glentoran fans, and even a few Linfield fans replied.
“I think the most fun people had with it was explaining to me what it is all about because I was so in the dark over it,” Day said.
It became such a social media phenomenon that White had friends in Belfast contacting him about if he knew Morgan Day in Oklahoma City. He went on Twitter, saw what was happening and offered to bring her a Glentoran jersey, scarf and copy of a book about the history of Glentoran FC.
“It exploded back home,” White said. “I was getting messages from
friends back in Belfast telling me they are in a line at a grocery store and people are talking about this Morgan Day in Oklahoma City.”
Anything Glentoran fans can do to remind Linfield fans of their crushing defeat, they will, White said.
“It was driving Linfield fans up the wall,” he said of the increased attention “Morgan Day” was getting in Ireland because Oklahoma City's Morgan Day had took the ball and ran with it .“They absolutely despised it and Glentoran's social media jumped on it.”
Media in Ireland began contacting Day and asking for interviews. Before the day was over, she had done a video interview on Skype with the BBC and sent other video messages to Irish media.
“I ended up in their national newspaper in northern Ireland,” Day said.
On the following Saturday, almost 10,000 Glentoran fans watched a replay of that 2005 epic match against Linfield on YouTube. Glentoran's newest fan in Oklahoma City joined them from across the pond.
Day has almost 700 new Twitter followers now, received several marriage proposals, and a trip to Belfast might be in her future. White has received several inquiries from friends in Belfast about the possibility of bringing Day to Ireland next year to celebrate “Morgan Day” with them in person.
Day said she has always wanted to travel and has moved Ireland to the top of her bucket list.
“I have had dozens of people reach out and say, `We got a Guinness with your name on it when you come over,'” she said.