The miracle of the Irishman at the Emirates Stadium

There was a family reunion for my wife Fionnuala’s ones last week and I ended up being a designated driver.

I didn’t mind at all but after leaving one group of hyper-active relations home, I got a call to say two of her cousins were stuck and needed a lift to Greencastle.

“Where the hell is that?”

“Not too far. They’ll keep you right,” Fionnuala said.

“And don’t be grumpy.”

I was grumpy. I went back to the hotel but there was no sign of the pair and when I eventually found them – at the residents’ bar – they couldn’t seem to comprehend that I wouldn’t join them for a drink.

“I’m your lift home, lads. Let’s get going. Where is Greencastle by the way?”

After a lot of prodding and cajoling and lassoing, I eventually got them into the car and off we went.

The bigger of the two got his phone out and started playing Elton John songs full belt. “Jesus, Elton is the master. The master!”

Before long, he was fast asleep in the back.

The fella sitting beside me seemed more sober and produced a bottle of beer from his pocket.

“Want one?’ he smiled.

“I’ll not bother, thanks.”

“Good on you, too. Pulling us out of a hole.”

We drove through the darkness: up small country roads, round bends, past churches. Yer man was kinda stuck on repeat – telling the same stories over again – but he was charming and amusing and he told me a great yarn that couldn’t have been made up.

He had decided he was going, but couldn’t get a ticket for love or money.

Undeterred, he booked a flight and a Premier Inn near the ground and at Dublin airport, he fell in with a group of Arsenal supporters who told him there were no spare tickets to be found – but they would take his number just in case.

During the flight they were behind him, carrying on and having a laugh, but one of them, slightly older, with glasses and an incongruous man-bun, was staring balefully. It was unnerving, he told me. 

Having tried every possible angle, yer man had resigned himself to watching the match at a supporters’ bar when his phone rang. It was a southern voice who told him he had got him sorted for the match and to meet him at a café close to the stadium at 5pm.

So, off he went and as he approached the café, he couldn’t see anyone with a ticket and was wondering if he had been pranked, when a voice below him said, “You’re the fella from Tyrone?”

It was the strange man from the plane, in a wheelchair. He explained that he had access to the disabled area and that wheelchair users were each allowed to bring a carer. The ticket was just £40, which is half the £80 he had to pay.

So, yer man wheeled man-bun up to the glittering Emirates Stadium and they were given red-carpet treatment and sat in the best seats in the house, just behind the nets to the left.

The bar was a dream, the food was five-star, the VIP treatment left, right and centre. And Arsenal won – on penalties – right where they were sitting.

The greatest night of his life, he smiled.

“What a story!” I said. “Proof there is a God.”

“Oh, that’s for sure,” he laughed. 

“It was a miracle, because when we left the stadium and I wheeled man-bun to the nearest bar, he stood up and folded the wheelchair, stretched himself and said ‘I’ll have a lager, please’.” 

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