Oh My Word!

I sometimes think about Derry City Football Club. There is much to ponder. To start, it’s not your average football club.

Persecuted in a previous life, they were forced into the wilderness before re-emerging on a different stage, where they felt more at home.

People often mention the crowds that Derry City attracted to matches from the mid-eighties to earlynineties. These aren't stories that have been beefed up through the ageing process of nostalgia. They really did bring huge crowds, both home and away. Sellout attendances at the Brandywell were not uncommon and any Pat's fan present on April 1, 1990, will have marvelled at the away turnout for a Sunday afternoon league match – albeit a very important one – at Harold's Cross Greyhound Stadium. Newspaper reports estimated that, in a crowd of between 7,000 and 8,000, Derry City fans filled half the ground.

These supporters had an extra incentive to attend games. For many of them, it was about more than football. In the five years proceeding their admission to the League of Ireland, the terraces at most Derry City homes games resembled a celebration-of-sorts. To understand why they were partying, it is important to retrace their journey.

Derry City had joined the Irish League in 1929, achieving sporadic success over the following decades, with three Irish Cups and one league title. However, it was that league triumph of 1965 that paved the way for others to see that this club was being treated differently.