IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT THE GOLF FOR RORY

My man crush on Rory Mcilroy went up a notch as I got to spend an evening in the same room as him on Tuesday night, attending a special charity event hosted by The Rory Foundation. The foundation does a lot of incredible work for some local charities – and helped build and develop Daisy Lodge in the aforementioned Newcastle – a therapeutic centre for young families who have been affected by cancer. It’s an incredible building – and there’s another currently being built in County Mayo thanks to the foundation’s hard work. Rory pulled some strings and had Pep Guardiola join him onstage at The Waterfront Hall for an evening of anecdotes and banter hosted by James Nesbitt. Pep opened up a little, mostly talking about the influence the late, great Johan Cruyff had on his career and explaining why Paul Scholes is the one United played he wishes he’d managed. W also saw footage of Pep’s international debut – which was, believe it or not – in Belfast – against an NI team featuring one Michael O’neill. Finally, we saw some incredible footage of him being a bit awesome at golf – including a video of Pep chipping straight into the cup from 100 yards, before being embraced by Ryan Giggs! One thing I thought I’d never see, however – Pat Jennings and Dennis Taylor on their feet with their mobile phones out dancing to surprise guest Shane Filan’s version of ‘You Raise Me Up’. A surreal – bu memorable evening for an outstanding cause.

ON PAR Rory Mcilroy with Pep Guardiola