Alan Mc Bride, Sunday Life, wonders why N Belfast supported Denmark

[T Fearon]

Alan if you have three weeks to spare I will tell you the reason why fellow drinkers in the North Belfast pub you were in watching the North of Ireland  Denmark game last Saturday night, were supporting the Danes, as you seem surprised by this in to-day's Sunday Life. I will tell you exactly the steps the IFA must take to attract community wide support

[Snowed Under]

Tony, during that 3 week tirade you could maybe explain to Alan that approximately half of the GAA Board were supporting Norn Iron against Spain.

906 members supporting them.   

[T Fearon]

Yes and of course no one from OWC massaged these votes?

[Chrisowc]

Yes and of course no one from OWC massaged these votes?

I post here and I didn't vote.  Too busy enjoying myself in the Canarian sun!  I would dare say there wasn't too many others from OWC around to vote either

[magickingdom]

Alan if you have three weeks to spare I will tell you the reason why fellow drinkers in the North Belfast pub you were in watching the North of Ireland  Denmark game last Saturday night, were supporting the Danes, as you seem surprised by this in to-day's Sunday Life. I will tell you exactly the steps the IFA must take to attract community wide support

can you post the article...

[Solomon Kane]

Yes and of course no one from OWC massaged these votes?

Brilliant post!

[cville]

God help Alan and I do feel so sorry for him after what happened on that day on the Shankill. However, he was caught in the headlights and allowed himself to be used by those who wanted to use him to further their own anti-sinn fein agenda in the mid-1990s. The fact is that to question how people in North Belfast could dislike NI shows that he never got the big picture. One month after the Shankill Bomb came the reason why Windsor Park is off limits for me and any decent thinking friend of mine... Perhaps we don't need to have Paddy Kielty to bring that night in November up (which I nearly did physically after watching him act the part!!!) ... The fact is that that night I supported the Republic and had since the Anton Rogan shite in 1989... The Sash may have gone but the No Surrender hasn't ... Tell you what .. I would have felt like a virgin at a setarian Prostitutes' convention at Gran Canaria last week... say on more!

[SammyG]

Tell you what .. I would have felt like a virgin at a setarian Prostitutes' convention at Gran Canaria last week... say on more!

WTF is that supposed to mean?

[his holiness nb]

Tell you what .. I would have felt like a virgin at a setarian Prostitutes' convention at Gran Canaria last week... say on more!

WTF is that supposed to mean?

Can someone explain to Sammy what virgin means?
I think he is ready for that talk 

[MW]

I will tell you exactly the steps the IFA must take to attract community wide support

Stop calling the team Northern Ireland, eh, Tone (like the RUC's name was changed to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, wasn't that what you referenced )

[MW]

God help Alan and I do feel so sorry for him after what happened on that day on the Shankill. However, he was caught in the headlights and allowed himself to be used by those who wanted to use him to further their own anti-sinn fein agenda in the mid-1990s. The fact is that to question how people in North Belfast could dislike NI shows that he never got the big picture. One month after the Shankill Bomb came the reason why Windsor Park is off limits for me and any decent thinking friend of mine... Perhaps we don't need to have Paddy Kielty to bring that night in November up (which I nearly did physically after watching him act the part!!!) ... The fact is that that night I supported the Republic and had since the Anton Rogan shite in 1989... The Sash may have gone but the No Surrender hasn't ... Tell you what .. I would have felt like a virgin at a setarian Prostitutes' convention at Gran Canaria last week... say on more!

As I posted on ILF a few months ago:

I was there as a 12 year old, as it happens, and yes there was plenty for a NI fan to be ashamed of that might, mainly ugly sectarian chanting by a significant minority.

However, even back then, many more 'political' rather than 'sporting' commentators (willfully?) did not grasp that this was a football match between neightbouring countries. Hostility towards the opposition will always form a part of football, especially in derby games - and we should make no apology for that. Back in those days I was a ballboy and used to stand in front of the 'shed' at Big Two matches at the Oval - now that in my opinion was a more hostile and at times ugly atmosphere, boiling over into violence on occasions (and I have to confess I used to enjoy my proximity to it, even when coins were winged my way). Add in to spice up this derby game the fact that the Republic needed a win to qualify for USA94, and Northern Ireland were witnessing the last game before retirement of their most successful ever manager.

On top of this, we had just had 'Black October' - the Shankill and Greysteel massacres being the main atrocities in a month of even higher levels of terrorist mass murder than were 'usual' in those days. The political situation meanwhile was as fraught as the security situation, with talk of Government communicatiom channels with the IRA; John Hume pushing, through Dublin, a 'deal' he had worked out with Gerry Adams; London and Dublin (which was still refusing to relinquish its illegal claim on NI) working on what became the Downing Street Declaration; Paisley roaring that Ulster was being sold out, etc.

The FAI deliberately decided to ratchet up and exploit tensions so they could get the game moved to a 'neutral' venue.

This 'Night in November' is often held up as some sort of totem, or a weapon to beat NI fans with, by the Fearons of this world. As if the incidence of some sectarian chanting at a football match should always been thrown back in our faces, when we are told that we need to move on an forget the terrorism that took place, when the very perpetrators of the sectarian mass murders of the time, the likes of Sean Kelly and Torrens Knight, have long since been released from prison having served a fraction of their life sentences.

[darbyo]

Hostility towards the opposition will always form a part of football, especially in derby games - and we should make no apology for that.

I'm not inclined to get involved in these arguements but do you really support this statement? Soccer will always have problems until this mindset is changed IMO.

[MW]

Hostility towards the opposition will always form a part of football, especially in derby games - and we should make no apology for that.

I'm not inclined to get involved in these arguements but do you really support this statement? Soccer will always have problems until this mindset is changed IMO.

Yes I do - soccer is often tribalist (and I don't mean that in the NI sense).

I'm referring to verbal hostility, and not of the racial or sectarian kind of course.

Don't get me wrong, I've been genuinely touched at some displays of 'togetherness' as a football fan - applauding Greek players and fans in Athens as they qualified for Euro2004, and getting applauded in return; the mutual applause and chanting of each other's country's name after the Poland-NI game in Warsaw in 2005; last season staying behind with a significant number of Glentoran fans to applaud the Linfield team, which had all but won the League on out home patch, even though the fact this had happened made us physically ill.

But at the same time, soccer rivalry is given its meaning in the fact that for 90 minutes, you're hostile to those rivals.

[darbyo]

Yes I do - soccer is often tribalist

All sports have a tribal aspect to them, all sports encourage emotion, passion and at times hostility. But in most sports you can freely walk the streets before a game, I get the impression that many soccer fans are more anti-opposition rather than pro their own team. I'm genuinely not having a go at soccer supporters or the game itself, just commenting on a statement that I think expresses an unfortunate attitude amongst soccer supporters.