Max Rushden’s piece, prior to last month’s Champions League final, written so evocatively and poignantly about how he’d given up his ticket for the game in Madrid in favour of watching it with his father, the man who’d instilled in him his grá as it were, of both Spurs and Cambridge United, hit right me in ‘the feels’. On reading the article, I’m sure I wasn’t the only person to reflect on my relationship with my own father, and what role the beautiful game has played in shaping that very relationship.

The first live soccer match I ever attended was a 2003 Champions League qualifier game in Dalymount Park between Bohemians and Rosenborg BK. Da took me along as a nephew of a teaching colleague of his at the time, Fergal Harkin was on the bench for Bohs that night. Having become somewhat obsessed with the game since the previous summer’s World Cup, largely because I’d managed to complete the Merlin sticker book for the tournament more than anything else, this was my first realisation that professional football did in fact exist beyond the ‘Barclaycard Premiership’ as it was at the time. The clichéd follow up at this stage would be to say that from that moment I was hooked, though in reality I don’t remember a great deal from the evening bar the balmy mid-summer conditions and a sense of frustration at full time caused by the concession of the away goal that a stubborn Bohs side eventually succumbed to, 1-0 with a second leg in Norway on the horizon. However, most importantly the tradition of Jim taking me to live football was born.

Fast forward nearly 16 years to Stradbrook last Friday night, the most recent game attended by the pair of us. Cabinteely FC, a club that didn’t exist as a League of Ireland entity on that night in Dalymount, hosted Wexford FC (formerly Wexford Youths) and on this occasion, we had a bit more skin in the game. From the age of seven right through to 19, I played schoolboy football with the club, while having the fortune/misfortune of being coached in some capacity by my ‘aul fella’ for a significant chunk of that period. During this time, Jim also served as chairman of the club from 2006-2009 as well as on countless other committees in the meantime. Thankfully, there are so many more volunteers like him in the club keeping the show on the road in both the junior section, and since 2015 as a League of Ireland First Division team as well. That spirit of volunteerism was evident in spades once again last Friday as the ‘Fiver Friday’ promotion was in full swing entitling every paying customer to their match ticket, a burger and drink from the bar as well as entry into the halftime raffle. The level of effort put in by so many to make this a success is one of the greatest strengths of the much derided ‘Greatest League in the World’ at this level. So many families, too many to mention individually, go above and beyond every matchday to do their own crucial little bit, whether that be setting up the pitch, manning the turnstiles, selling programmes, working in the shop or flipping burgers, they all play their part in giving us a team to support on a Friday night.

As for the game itself, much had been made on social media about Cabinteely’s new Japanese signing, Yuta Sasaki, however he had to make do with a place on the bench to begin with. The league’s bottom side gave Cabo a run for their money early on with the opening period’s exchanges ending honours even at 0-0. However, Luke Clucas’ well placed free-kick only minutes after the restart gave the home-side the lead before Sean Callan’s straight red card for an, at best clumsy challenge on Keith Dalton 20 minutes from the end effectively ended the game as a contest. Shortly after that point though, was when the real fun began. There was a substitution needed in the ‘press box’ as Declan Traynor on the Public Address system required an early exit, and as cool as you like Caroline Traynor, en route to “collecting” her husband from his position nabbed Jim from the terraces to replace him and see out the last 15 minutes of the game on the mic. Now Jim’s eyesight isn’t quite what it used to be, so in order to ensure accuracy in communication with the 400 or so spectators in attendance, I was only too happy to accompany him up to the ‘press box’, which in reality can most readily be described as a prefab on stilts, a fine vantage point nonetheless. Shortly after settling ourselves, there was some activity on the Cabo bench, it was time for Yuta Sasaki to make his debut. Thankfully for all concerned, Declan had written our new signing’s surname phonetically on the team sheet, allowing the announcement of the substitution and Jim’s first big task of the evening to go off without a hitch. The way the game was going, we’d have been forgiven for thinking that was our job done, except we weren’t quite finished yet. As the clock ticked towards the 90^th minute, Keith Dalton’s marauding run down the right flank was followed by a perfectly weighted cross-field pass to find the unmarked Sasaki ghosting into the space left behind a stretched Wexford defence. The young debutant still had a bit to do, but there followed two perfect touches to set himself before dispatching the ball past Corey Chambers to cap the perfect debut, seal the three points and send the two boys in the ‘press box’ into delirium.

As two Irish men, grand expressions of emotion and feeling between one another aren’t exactly our strongest suits. That’s why these particular moments are so special to me, and it’s our mutual involvement in the game of football and this club that have brought so many like them before. For our most recent experience we have the ‘Greatest League in the World’ and a moment of magic from a little Japanese winger to thank and hopefully there’ll be many of them to come.