That Craig's Heartstrong Guy...

Episode Transcript
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(00:05):
Hello and welcome to the Upfront and Unfiltered podcast.
I'm your host Dean Turton and this week I am joined by what many think is a
one club man, one club football man, Paul Healy.
Corinthians through and through, although he does have a bit of Braddon in him
these days. He did play for them last season honestly.
He's also probably most known for being the chairman

(00:26):
of the Craig's heartstrong foundation and the
fantastic work they do so healy how
are you mate yeah all good thanks mate yeah thank you very
much for inviting me let me start off by saying thank
you very much for the work that you do i know you're
pretty new to it and you've you've took off pretty pretty quickly
and you're loving putting a bit more back into manx football

(00:47):
it's better than being the golf shite i was yeah yeah
yeah you could say so you know going back
over the years if when we played if we had the likes
of yourself and Hattie and Gary Waidman and things like
that would have been great for us to be able to look back on
things so you know I've got a kid growing up now just
starting playing senior football so for him this type of thing that you do and

(01:10):
the other guys do is brilliant so just thank you for that first of all I appreciate
that mate really do and as I say it keeps me involved in the game a little bit
so honestly I massively massively appreciate that Yeah it's a lot of work but it's also you know Now,
if you're into it, I did read there that you were losing the love for Manx footy.
So this is giving you that love back. It is back, mate.

(01:32):
So I'm going to start here like I do with everyone.
How did you get into Manx football? How did I get into Manx football?
So, yeah, probably just friends back in the day. Because, again,
the youngsters don't know how lucky they are to start football at under sixes and things like that.
I think ours was under 14s, was the first junior football that we could play. so sign for St.

(01:54):
George's you might not have known this my junior under 14's football was at St.
George's with Steve Lennon and the likes of Doona and Matty Palmer,
the Starkey brothers things like that and we had a real good real good scutch
of quite talented youngsters there actually Richard Clarke was the coach,

(02:16):
I don't know if you've ever heard of Richard Clarke, he was actually a teacher
at Andreas back in the day.
And Skipper, Pete Roney, I think his name, works down at B&B or has done for many years.
I'm not sure if he's still there, but he was part of the coaching team there as well.
And yeah, playing for St. George's at an early age got me right into,

(02:37):
I was always into football, but like I say, this was the first time you could ever play.
And we were sponsored by the co-op. We had this beautiful home and away kit.
If you did well in training, Richard Clarke would give you a Mars bar.
I don't think you could do that these days. No, you can't. You'd probably get done.
Yeah, it's that type of nonsense nowadays, isn't it? But yeah,

(02:59):
a co-op pen if you could hit the crossbar at the end of training.
Just little things like that.
At that age, it's what you appreciate, isn't it? You're not expecting medals and world beaters.
No, we were all under 14, so it stood out for me.
Someone like Richard Clarke, he was a superb coach.
When I say coach, probably my manager more than anything else.

(03:21):
He brought his own from being boys into starting to be meds.
Yeah. And talked you through that.
And we got on with him really well. But he also had that teacher side in him.
Luckily, we were playing in the 80s and Liverpool were successful at the time.
So that was something else that really got me into football.

(03:43):
You know, Steve Nicol was my hero.
Back in the day, he was a ginger-haired full-back. So to me,
it was the perfect fit for me.
And obviously going back through that Liverpool team with John Barnes and Liam
Rush and players like that, you can't not get into it if you're watching that every week.
Well, yeah. It's like these young boys now, isn't it? I had the privileges of

(04:07):
growing up with Roy Evans and Roy Hodgson. Yeah.
You know, they were great people to look up to and to aspire to.
That's why I go play football isn't it maybe that was when it all started going
wrong wasn't it yeah as Liverpool fans we had a we had a bit of a traumatic
20 years or so didn't we we're back now we're back can't go nice to see but yeah St George's,

(04:31):
but then as I got a little bit older a lot of my friends were at Corinthians
so I made the move over 14s to 16s was all over at Corinthians and that's where
my love for Corinthians just came from.
I enjoyed a very successful spell at that 14th or 16th kind of age with Lunte

(04:53):
and Stewie Christian and Matty Cole.
And there's a whole load of players that were there that were,
they were all the first team. Keith Brown, they were the first.
I think I was subbed for that team because these boys that were a year younger than me were so good.
And they won a lot of... And you could play senior football then,
back then, couldn't you?
Yeah. as well and i think i think now that's that's the

(05:15):
difference isn't it i think with a lot of clubs you had
them lads that were able to play saturday sunday and
you hadn't got them in whereas now you can't you're kind of hanging
on to the kids as long as possible now like waiting for them to turn 16 now
if anything happens in between that they go off to another club and you've lost
them haven't you and that's it yeah back then i i turned you know the age you

(05:39):
were able to play for Comby and couldn't get in the Corinthians Comby.
So I just wanted to play football. So I went back. I went back to St.
George's and played in their Comby because, as you know, St.
George's Comby has never really been the be-all and end-all of the club, has it? No.
As we're kind of unfortunately starting to see now.
Yeah. If you don't look after the entire club itself and that's juniors and

(06:04):
everything, then you are going to struggle down the line. so I really hope St.
George's can pick it up and can get players back down again because they're
a bit of a marmite a lot of there's a lot of people love them a lot of people
hate them but for me they could be a victim of their own success in ways yeah
they could be but for me they are a team that need to be in they need to be

(06:27):
in the league and they need to be there and you know people can tell me oh it's great what's happening.
I've actually got a guest lined up in a couple of weeks from St.
George's and we're going to talk talk all about as well so it'll be
really interesting to get their perspective on it and yeah no it's
johnny myers is actually going to come down himself yeah so i
think i'll be really interested to have that conversation with johnny and

(06:47):
just see what he says yeah going forward i think a lot of people
will be eager to hear that and see how
he feels on it as well yeah because like i say the opinion is very very split
yeah all across the island you know some people are laughing at their demise
but to me St George's were a massive part of of when I played yeah and obviously

(07:07):
my junior my junior football was played there so I don't want to see them go
I don't want to see them fold.
Probably want to see them get relegated ahead of Braddon this season.
It's not looking likely.
It's not, no, it's not. But to be fair, they did. I watched them on Saturday
play Old Boys in the Cup. They got knocked out by a Div 2 team in the Cup. Do you know what I mean?
And there was players playing for them. Pekka came off the bench.

(07:29):
Myers started. Chris Bass Jr. started, played the whole game.
It's sad to see where they are from what they've been.
But hopefully they can resurrect that and get that back, hopefully.
Yeah, and I know they've put a junior set-up in there now. but it's it's
very young very young juniors so it's going to take about 10-15
years to get that you look around the other clubs onken

(07:51):
laxey corinthians even yeah they've got all these 16 year olds coming through
bradden bradden did it a little while ago with with my young fella joining there
they only have two age groups of of junior football but bradden have kind of
took advantage of that all these 16 year olds have come straight into the combi
straight into to the first team.
Well, you look at the team that got them promoted and the teams,

(08:13):
even people that are scoring now, like Duncan Raid, I don't think he's that
old, is he? Duncan Raid is 17.
Yeah, do you know what I mean? Most of the boys now, they're just turning 18
this kind of school year.
So if they can stay up, then brilliant. Even if they don't stay up,
if they can stay together, that's the main thing, isn't it?
My worry is there are a few lads there that are good enough to move on somewhere

(08:37):
else or maybe think they're good enough to move on somewhere else.
But my worry is yeah if they do go
down they'll lose a few yeah but at the end of the day that's football isn't
it it's Manx football especially yeah if they think they're good enough to go
somewhere else then they can go somewhere else and like I say that's why we
got onto that I went back to St George's played a season in the Comby there

(08:58):
I was actually up front for a few games with Ricky Riley,
never played up front in my life but again it was just I just wanted to play
football there was a space there you filled it space there Yeah,
the Corinthians combi at the time was very clicky.
The manager was picking all his mates, things like that.
I'm not going to name them, but Billy Crow and Davey Ozzer-Hughes and all them boys.

(09:20):
But listen, that's what they did it for. Yeah.
Corinthians, as you've probably seen over the years, we could play football,
but that wasn't why we were there.
We were there to party, really.
We were there to go out on Saturday nights and Friday nights,
actually. On Friday nights.
Which is probably why we weren't as good as what we could have been.

(09:41):
We did like a Friday night out. We did like a Saturday night out.
Jefferson's jimmy b's all that you know throwbacks i'm
going back going back to toffs and paramount and
everything else right roll out paramount three o'clock saturday
morning and you roll it up the hill to play geordie's at at two
o'clock in the afternoon that's exactly what it was and you know

(10:01):
i know there's a question coming later from hattie and these
these are kind of the reasons for that not even on that
question i i've got a question from someone else and
i'll let you guess who it's front okay okay okay
and you you know this person extremely
well okay yeah okay all right
and it just says how did you manage your football fitness

(10:23):
regime after copious amounts of cheeky
vimptos and loopy juice that's gotta
be my mom it is your mom yeah yeah well
i didn't did i that's the
reason reason why yeah loopy juice so that was uh that was
a liter bottle of leafy milch wine that we used
to drink before we went out dirt cheap yeah yeah right

(10:45):
special off the bottom shelf yeah and that
was again that was she she knows because we had the deck set up in my bedroom
and all the lads had come around before a night out and we'd be playing the
90s dance music and she loved it she loved having all the boys around feeding
us with the with chips and yeah sandwiches and just get Get the oven on,

(11:05):
the little sausage rolls and everything.
I think she was more worried. She just wanted to lie on our stomachs before we went out.
But yeah, she's right. The cheeky vimptos were, they were something else.
A bit lethal. But yeah, that was, we'd go to Jefferson's at five o'clock on a Friday for happy hour.
And then we'd buy a load of Orange Wicked just before the next happy hour started.

(11:27):
So just before that happy hour ended and we'd wait for the next happy hour to
start. And yeah, we'd end up in Paramount and back.
Back up in the morning and a bit of breakfast and then
up to play whoever we were playing so yeah we
we didn't take it as seriously as we should have
done at Corinthians but that's not why we were there
we were there for a laugh with your mates and it was a friendship thing yeah

(11:49):
sometimes it was funnier turning up drunk the next day because we were playing
the likes of the Grand Slam Laxey team or you know Peel with Nij Shimon and
players like that and we knew we were on for a hiding but.
We've just turned up and try and enjoy it as much as we can.
Sometimes we might get a surprise draw or hold them pretty tight.

(12:12):
And then other times we'd walk away at 10-0.
But you'd have a laugh about it. We'd go straight to the pub afterwards with
the Peel lads, you know, with the Laxey lads.
And I don't really know whether much of that goes on anymore.
You know, after games, you get the odd one or two, I think, that go and have
a pint with the opposition.
But we would generally insist on the whole team going back to wherever the home

(12:36):
teams were at. Football.
Yeah, we'd all fly back there and sometimes we'd end up out with the opposition lads.
We'd all go straight out from the archery or whatever.
So, yeah, to me, you know, people mention football career. It wasn't a football
career in Manx football.
It was a football pastime. It was a hobby. It was something that made you have,

(12:58):
you know, spend more time with your friends.
And we loved all that. That rolls into that question from Hattie that you mentioned
just earlier, where he says, looking back at your footballing career,
you played in five finals.
I'd only won one of them. But you were promoted three times as runners-up.
Do you think you could have achieved more? Yeah, basically he's calling me a loser, isn't he?

(13:21):
A serial loser, I think he's calling you. Yeah, I mean, I've always,
when people have asked me about Mags football, I've always said that my collection
of runners-up medals is impressive-ish, you know, weird.
The first one, Hattie listed them all out for me actually in a separate message.
So we lost the Gold Cup against Polrose in 1990 and we were promoted runners-up then. Yeah.

(13:45):
We were then relegated in 2000. So, you know, we came up, we went down,
we gave it a try. We had a laugh.
We won the Gold Cup against Colby the next year. Yeah. I actually captained the team for that.
Well, that was your second question. He said, that's when you beat Colby.
How intense was your rivalry with them?

(14:06):
Oh, we hated them. We hated them because... I don't know where this comes from in my football.
It wasn't Colby as a team. It was more, they always beat us.
We wanted to win the second division and Colby were always our main rivals until
Old Boys came, dropped down and came along and our rivalry with Old Boys was,
that was just as fierce, but actually a lot more friendly.

(14:30):
Colby at the time was Robin Bates, Stewie Bell Scott, Wardy,
you know, they're all good lads.
Yeah. But they were on it on a Saturday, you know, for a second division team, they were very good.
Yeah. And the likes of Robin and Stewie Bell Scott left and went to St.
George's and were in that very successful.

(14:50):
Yeah. George's team through the years so they were a bit like we had Glenno
and Luntie in in our team they wanted to have a laugh but at some stage it came
along and they thought you know what,
actually yeah I'm actually I'm actually really good so I'm gonna leave I'm gonna
and it was a tough decision Glenno went first and then he dragged Luntie along

(15:15):
with him and you know Glenno was very successful there.
Luntie, unfortunately, didn't have enough time there to be successful because
I think we would have, I think the St.
George's bandwagon would have rolled on for many years if Luntie was in that
team as well. Yeah. Because they were.
Started a bit earlier than they did. Yeah. And they were an unbelievable side, weren't they?

(15:37):
But was the, my biggest moment in Manx football Football was probably playing in the FA Cup final.
Let me have a look. The FA Cup final in 2002.
I'm not sure what year it was, actually. It was against St. Mary's,

(15:59):
and we were second division, and we'd beaten Colby on the way.
Sorry, not Colby. We'd beaten Russian on the way, and the Cup final was down
at Castletown, and this was Chris Feeney was in the team for St.
Mary's because I think he played for every club almost on the island,
didn't he? Old Feeney. Didn't he? Took a few boxes, didn't he?

(16:20):
Yeah. No, he was a class player as well. He was an engine, wasn't he? Do you know what?
He's like a little terrier, wasn't he? Yeah, he was. And unfortunately, they won 1-0.
So, second division team going to the cup final.
We didn't go out the night before because it was a big cup final for us.
So, we took that one a little bit serious. I think it was the first one that

(16:41):
was live recorded on the radio now Tony Meppam was doing it with the late.
It wouldn't be Jeff Cannell, would it? No, it was, apologies,
my head and names is Kev Manning, the late, great Kev Manning.
He was, I think he was the island manager at the time. Yeah.

(17:02):
And he was, him and Mep did the first ever live recording of an FA Cup final,
I think, or a final. Yeah.
So it was a big, kind of big moment for us and for us to get as a second division
team, like I say, with the likes of Luntie and people like that.
We were pretty chuffed with that. To get beat 1-0, I mean, Feeney scored the

(17:25):
only goal and I was marking him from the free kick.
He's never let you live it down. No, he's never let me live it down.
I've never let myself live it down because I was pretty good.
We played pretty well in that game. John Coppell stood out in that game as well, so he tells me.
But yeah, we had Paul Davis, myself, Glennon.
I'm surprised Davis wasn't too busy closing roads somewhere. yeah

(17:47):
yeah well he's he's doing a great job of that isn't he
yeah he's fantastic at that temporary traffic light support yeah i
mean it's taken everyone so long to get into work nowadays isn't
it because davis is in control but yeah no no we had a great team we had a great
team and i've going back to hattie yes if we if we had put our mind to it and

(18:08):
i think that came a bit later on in life with the likes of saint george's there
was meal plans being thrown at a few players and and stuff like that.
And that's when Manx football did start to change a little bit.
The evolution of it, sort of. Yeah. It went from a silk on a Friday night and
a Saturday night to actually, let's go and try and win something.
It went from pub football to, you know, a little bit more of,

(18:32):
I'm not going to say semi-professional, but just a bit more.
The attitude towards it changed to actually trying to win something,
not just having a laugh with your mates.
Yeah. And that change has allowed
out a lot of those players to mold into this FC Allemand now, which.
You know, FC Alleman has taken away all the best players on the island,

(18:53):
but it's now given the chance for, you know, the likes of my lad and these 16-year-olds,
they're all getting straight into the team and it's bringing them on.
And I think in another few years' time, we'll start to really reap the benefits
within the Manx game that these youngsters are getting to play earlier than
what they would have done.
And actually some of them will start playing for FC Alleman as well.

(19:15):
And you'll just see this new kind of generation of footballer coming through.
I think it's great. You know, people, again, hate it. Some people hate it. Some people love it.
Some of my mates are obsessed by it. They're down every week.
You know, the scarves, the hats. I've got a scarf myself.
Not been down as much as I would like to. That's a personal reason for myself

(19:37):
because I like to have my tea at a very nice time.
We like to have our Chinese at like half six, seven o'clock every Saturday.
First person down in China town, you know.
Don't even phone them up anymore. Pretty much, yeah.
And that is one of the reasons if they did start moving the FC Alleman games
to a different kickoff earlier, I know it would disrupt the Mags game,

(20:00):
which is why it's kept late on.
But I don't know, I'd then be torn to go and watch, you know,
my lad play at Braddon and Corinthians when I've got a free week to go down,
because I still try and go down and watch Corinthians into whatever I can.
And then you've got FC Alleman again so the
Manx game at the moment I like it I like it

(20:21):
so that's it so we'll we'll just end so your playing days yeah so how do they
come to an end so my playing days my last ever game not my last official game
because there was a couple of a couple of games I came back in when they were
they were not going to they weren't going to be able to field the team so came
back in my last ever game was actually a cup final against St.
George's the hospital cup final against St.

(20:44):
George's we lost 2-0 I was actually man of
the match on the day and I had my young fella in
my arms when I've got a lovely picture of the two of us going up for the man
of the match trophy but yeah wouldn't be as Hattie's question before that wouldn't
be a highlight for me because it was it was kind of the last yeah it was I capped

(21:05):
in the team it was my last ever game we got beat.
Well probably was one of my biggest highlights maybe it was actually when I
come to think of it but that FA Cup final down at
yeah down at castle town for us being a second division team
that for me was was something else and
yeah we'll never kind of forget that but

(21:25):
then i did yeah i played another game i
came back to play away to air and i
actually ended up in team of the week that week and i thought i was useless
so i don't know who was picking it that week and then
i came back another game against laxi i think
we got beat about seven or eight nil and ashley
webster i didn't i didn't know who he was but he scored

(21:46):
seven or six he was silly I think he
moved to Australia didn't he I think he might
have done but in that game I gave Johnny Callow the biggest
dead leg of his career and he had to go off and it
was always going to be payback because many years ago I bought these brand new
Predator boots you know the Predators the ones that are coming back they're

(22:07):
coming back now and they're in a lot of the media now aren't they how amazing
they were well these ones were the you know, the goat of football.
Yeah, proper leather with a tongue on it. The tongue hanging down.
I had Healy three embroidered on them with the three legs of man.
And the first game playing against Johnny Callow, it was accidental,

(22:28):
but his studs got caught in the tongue and it ripped the tongue off in the first game.
And I was just like, you're getting it.
Anyway, I never managed to get him. So it took me about 15 years to actually
get him back, apart from marrying his sister.
I was going to say because marrying his sister is a bit of payback isn't it
marrying his sister was a bit of payback as well yeah so yeah I got him in this

(22:51):
game and he literally had to go off with a dead leg and I felt a bit sorry for him afterwards but.
Yeah, let me just say what a player he was, by the way, Johnny.
If it wasn't for injury, again, injury finished him off, didn't it?
Yeah, and he played in, again, another amazing team.
But even when he wasn't in that amazing team, he was still firing the goals in.

(23:12):
He actually, Danny Orem this season is reminding me of Johnny Callow because
he's got that same kind of glide across the pitch when he's running and some
of his finishing is superb.
Herb and yeah the couple of games that I have seen Danny play this year fair
play to Danny another one a bit
like Feeney he's had more clubs than Tiger Woods hasn't he well he's been.

(23:36):
Crinthians, Air Crinthians, Air Laxey played for Ramsey I was going to say
he had a bit for Ramsey as well yeah he's been Ramsey yeah but he's doing dead
well I don't know if he's still top scorer I think he is I don't know did Air
have a couple of games off so I don't know if Gale has caught him up right okay
I think Air have got a couple of games in hand But he's up there anyways with Gale.
Him and Gale are the two top goal scorers on the island. So that's how your playing days went.

(24:00):
So before we go on to the next area, which we've already touched on,
what you think is good in Mags football, I've got a question from one of your
former teammates, Dave Bignall. Oh, Dave Bignall, yeah.
And he just wants to know, do you know that Alan Kirk is his left half?
I want to know what this is about because David said this the other day.

(24:22):
Yeah, I've been curious about it.
This is more a historic kind of joke when someone's late for the news or something like that.
You know, it's like, oh, you know, if someone comes in and says,
oh, did you hear the news about this? And we all knew about it ages ago or whatever.
Biggie just used to come out with, do you hear where Kervishley's left Charlton?

(24:45):
And it's carried on. And through my, when I was obsessed we're playing football
manager on the on the on the computer it came up across the screen once,
charlton sack curvishly so i've got
this screenshot from years ago like dead old screenshot from from my from my
like one of the nokia phones back in the day that when the first ones you could

(25:07):
take a picture on so it's a really bad picture that gravy it's good all they
read it yeah and each year it comes up on my memories and biggie sends me a
quick message or whatever but yeah biggie the a terrier,
yeah he would kick a few shins I'll tell you that so we'll move on so that's
your playing days we have missed a little bit out of that you know you've missed
out your Brad and your little oh yeah my little little cameo at Brad and that

(25:31):
was again that was all down to Thomas playing in the juniors and.
I'm finding out one night that Bradham were on the verge of not putting any team in for a season.
And my thoughts on that were, if you don't put any team in at all, you could fold.
I mean, St Mary's, thankfully, I think they've got back. They did fold.

(25:53):
They did fold. They removed themselves from the league for a year because they couldn't field a team.
Yeah, they couldn't field a first-team or a combi, which my fear at Bradham
was, if you don't do that once, you're never getting back from it. but St.
Mary's has got the kind of attraction of the bowl and everything else. They've got the bowl.
And to be fair, the people behind the scenes, I know like Josh Evans is the chairman there now.

(26:15):
Yeah. But the Doolies. The Doolies, they've done so much for that club.
And you can go round, I mean, massive credit to the Doolies,
but you go round every club over here and everyone's got a Dooley.
Everyone's got a Stan. Everyone's got, you know, a Mepham.
Laxey have got their boys. yeah that's that's

(26:35):
as a monday club yeah the monday club they all go
down and do the pitch my father-in-law who's chairman of laxey
dave is part of that monday club and so he
only goes down there to drown his sorrows from everton getting beat yeah everton
getting beat and i think he takes all the leftover cakes from from janet's sunday
roast when i'm around on a sunday so yeah every club's got those and you know

(26:58):
without that and without like i said to you before with with what you're doing.
Without that type of thing, things just fall apart.
And Braddon, unfortunately, it wasn't because they never had those people at the club.
In my view, they got promoted...
Battled so hard I mean they won everything that year they got promoted they

(27:19):
battled so hard baby driver you know banging the goals in,
Andrews at the back you know they had such a good team they
battled for the whole season they kept themselves up which this is the main
thing for me is they kept themselves up and a lot of them kind of went nah I'm
not doing that again and they just went and you know what I don't blame them

(27:42):
in a way yeah but the club Hope was on the verge of just, to me, disappearing.
So it was kind of a Facebook rally cry.
I put out there and I said, look, if anyone wants to just get into the game
and have a kick about, I went down training.
My first training session was actually after a two-week holiday in Florida.
So it was awful.

(28:04):
It was awful. But Matty Palmer, Watty, you know, players like that all.
But Palmer had a couple of seasons at Braddon as well.
And there was players that just turned up from nowhere that were just like yeah
do you know what go on and we managed to get a combi team together i only played a few games because.

(28:25):
Basically it was a rally rally cry and we'd managed to get
enough people there yeah to kind of take the club forward for
that season but i do remember i was playing st george's because we only put
a combi in that year so we played st george's and we rolled up at st george's
pitch and walked walked out and this thing when players have been injured back
they came and Sean Quay Sam Cain and,

(28:49):
ringham was there i think uh julian ringham was there sean
quay san cain and joey morley
oh they were all playing combi that week and
i was like oh for god's sake anyway we only i think
we went one nil up yeah we went one nil up and i
think we got beat four one in the end something like that do you know what and it
was so enjoyable and it made me think oh

(29:11):
why did i quit well get the book back a
little i quit because i had a slipped disc in me back and really thomas
was was only 18 months old and i couldn't if
i played on a saturday i couldn't pick him up off the floor till
like wednesday or something like that so so to me
it was a no-brainer just to just to give it all up but things like that those
little cameo appearances made me think oh and you got the one with thomas didn't

(29:34):
you as well i got that yeah i got that friendly with thomas i came on at half
time and it showed them up no i didn't really i didn't really the first thing
that happened was one of their players,
knocked the ball down the wing and off he went and I was trying to chase him
and I could just hear John Coppell and me mate Richard Chatton laughing on the sidelines at me.

(29:55):
And yeah, it was just, I just wanted to play at half with Thomas.
They never had enough kit so the guy that had come off at half time Swapped his shield.
It was soaking wet. It was, it was disgusting. I was freezing.
It's not for more. And that was, that was one where I thought, nah,
it's not for me and I go back to it was actually
on here we were playing old boys for

(30:17):
Braddon Comby and the rain
was coming down I even asked the ref halfway through
the game look is this going to carry on because I can't see
my boots we were sinking in the pitch I think
it was Buckley special Buckley's got the game on that's
what I always used to call them at old boys yeah and I think I think the stewards
were back oh when they come back from Australia I think the stewards were back

(30:40):
yeah and we were getting and Coxon was playing I think it was probably that
year Old Boys won the Junior Cup yeah and you had like Coxon literally running
rings founders running rings founders and.
I've never in my life asked a referee to stop a game, but I asked him in this one.
And my late great friend, Paul Yates, God bless him, our goalkeeper took a goal

(31:03):
kick, and it was a really bad goal kick, and it came along the floor at me at centre-back.
And I tried to kind of hoof it over my shoulder to clear it,
and I just hoofed it straight up in the air.
And as it came down, one of the stewards went in one-on-one,
knocked it in, and the rain was pouring down, and I just heard my mate Yatesy laughing from the car.
I looked over and he's got a picture of, he had a picture of me just with my

(31:27):
arms dangling down. Soaking wet.
Soaking wet. Yeah. Like 42 years of age or 43 years of age.
And it was just, yeah, that man does not want to be there was,
was the picture he sent me. Got to do it, yeah.
But in my view, it kind of saved Braddon for that season.
And then the next season they managed to get themselves back in order.

(31:48):
And, and now they've got these junior lads coming through. and I think they've got their centenary.
Is it their centenary or 75 years maybe? Next year, is it?
There's a dinner this year. There's a dinner. Is it 2024? Yeah,
it could be 2024. I think there's a dinner this year.
I think it is for Brandon. Yeah, so it's their centenary this year. So fair play to them.

(32:10):
Again, they've got the guys behind the scenes, Shane and all them boys. Steve Goldsmith.
The Goldsmiths and the, yeah, they're a good set of lads.
It's just a shame that pitch is where it is. it's
where it is where it is they've managed to cut down some of
them trees over the last couple of years I think still not
managed to cut down that one that's a bit controversial was it they've had

(32:30):
a couple of assists off it this year yeah I've seen that this year and
I think that's why that corner of the pitch is so bad the water
drips down off them trees yeah and I think as well you
get the run off from St George's up that because you don't realise how steep
that drop off is from up there as well it's just well I do because
when we trained up there on the 14s when that ball went over you had to go and

(32:51):
get it and you were down there sometimes you'd miss the whole training session
because you were trying to find this ball and he wouldn't let you come back
wouldn't let you come back unless you found the ball fetch your own shit kind
of thing yeah yeah definitely so right we'll move on we've touched on it already,
this is the part where we talk about the good and bad what you think is good
and bad in mountain football at the moment absolutely I think the good part
you've already covered that really with FC Alleman the good part yeah FC Alleman

(33:14):
the juniors now getting their chance.
The players that were kind of on the peripheral peripheral of,
of being, you know, the, the best at the club are now the best at the club,
you know, so it's given them a bit of a boost.
The first couple of months when I was down watching, it was a shock.
The standard had just kind of gone down a little bit.

(33:37):
And people won't mind me saying that because you've basically took all the best players out.
It's naturally going to do that. If you take the best of anything away,
it's never going to be as good as it was until people get back up to speed.
Unfortunately for us Corinthians, we'd just become the best team on the island.
And to then take all of that away, it was harsh. It was. It was harsh.

(34:00):
But, you know, FC Alamand is something that we've always wanted to happen on
the island. We've wanted that team to be going across.
And, you know, I think I'd say Georgia's tried it years ago and stuff.
St. George has gone in for a bit. I think they played in the VAR.
Old boys played in the VAR. Yeah. You know. And that was kind of what they always wanted that.
And FC Alamand's now come along. And like I say, some people are obsessed by it.

(34:24):
And so they should be. They should be happy with it, proud of it.
You know the work that jill christian and all the committee and
you know there's so many people volunteer week in
week out i see it week in week out like i'm quite fortunate i volunteer with
my i write a lot of their match reports and stuff for them you know help them out
when i can and you don't see like i
get down there probably five o'clock on a saturday quarter past five yeah

(34:46):
and there's people putting out banners around the outside the stewards
it could be pissing rain and they're stood outside you've got
like the ambulance people and then you've got all the people upstairs as
well that you don't see you know you all you see is the
15 lads 16 lads on a saturday jonesy and
who's in the dugout you don't see what's going on behind the scenes to
make sure they've got a shirt on their back they've got

(35:06):
enough money to go on that plane to go away you know
there's a lot of work no it's brilliant there's a lot of work there's
a lot of you know a lot of money gone into it as well and you
know there's the sponsors that they're getting yeah you know you can't
do stuff like this without without the backing financial backing
of of things like that so they're doing all right things i've seen recently
the sponsorship with the steam packet as well brilliant for to get them on board

(35:30):
because that'll help in the better months as we say exactly if that if that
boat's going well yeah yeah but.
Yeah, FG Alamand being the facilities over here now, for me, is massive.
Again, we trained on that tiny little part of St. George's pitch,

(35:50):
which was just a bog during the winter.
Now you've got the bowl, you've got Bermaheague, you've got all the Astro pitches
around the island. I think Colby's a big testament. Colby's brilliant.
Massive clubhouse, they've got the Astro turf. I think they've got three pitches down there.
Peel, they've got the Tommy Klukas there now. God rest his soul, Dorsey, Kelvin Dawson.
Yeah Dorsey's name on it and you know again those boys

(36:12):
that have put all that together they must be very proud to see
Dorsey's name and Tommy Flukas's name as well
because they've they've put a lot of a lot
of blood sweat and tears into all of that and that community centre is absolutely
fantastic it's a great set up yeah I know Neil Cain and the boys have done so
much for that and they're brilliant lads yeah again on the football pitch I

(36:35):
might not have said that but but off the pitch but off the pitch yeah yeah and,
Yes, we used to play, you look at Corinthians now up at Bala Fletcher,
we played, a lot of people might not know this because they all just think Corinthians
have played at Bala Fletcher forever.
Noble's Park, that pitch on the top there. Where they put the VIP tent at TT
Week, that was our pitch there and we used to have to go on before the game

(36:59):
and take the dog muck off.
Well probably just after years when i was a kid i was probably 10 i think i must have been under 12.
Quilly you know mike william yeah yeah quilly used to
live a couple of doors up the road from me and he used to coach you under 12
with billy crowe yeah well quilly was our manager for
for a while as well yeah so i had quilliam quilly used to in his i think he's

(37:20):
still got the same work van now but he had back then yeah it's all a mess yeah
yeah it's all a mess what he used to honestly the most you mean about 10 10
of us in the back of that van yeah covered in plastic covered in all sorts we
go down that pitch we're down there nine o'clock on a Saturday morning he didn't
care if it was raining whatever yeah,
pick the dog shit up go and trade on it for an hour and you know what that pitch
was horrible it was awful it was on a slant yeah if you were playing right back

(37:44):
you couldn't see you couldn't see the top corner of the opposite goal and you
also like people like we all know and people but younger people now won't realise
it waves it goes up and down oh yeah so you could
play a ball and it'd go in one of the divots but it wouldn't roll
up the other side of it sometimes it was mental that
pitch awful pitch and the trees behind the goal it's like

(38:05):
at Brandon the trees behind the goal used to overhang yeah yeah well
yeah we played St George's and we
actually beat them I think it was 4-3 we beat St George's on that pitch and
it was the it was the Callum Morrissey St George's team and myself and Kev Harding
were playing centre back and we were marking Callum that day and he said after

(38:25):
the game what a good job we'd done on him which to me was brilliant because,
but anyway we were 4-3 up and I think they were trying to go the whole season unbeaten yeah.
We got five minutes from the end and Duna was taking a goal kick and Duna's
kicking was, he'll say it himself, was atrocious.
And he kicked one into the tree. Anyway, the ref gave a drop ball.

(38:47):
So the next time the ball went out, I said to Duna, kick it in that tree again,
Duna. And we kept doing it.
And Bassey Senior on the sideline and Bassey Junior, they were going absolutely mental.
But we were just like, just keep kicking it in that tree.
Keep getting that drop ball. I think we had about three or four drop balls on the trot.
And we ended up winning the game and it was unheard

(39:08):
of because again we were right down the bottom of the league Geordies
were the top and that's what that's what we
loved about it every now and again we could turn up and do something like that
and to walk away with the win against Geordies yeah they hated us for that So
we'll move on okay we've talked about the good of Manx football what do you

(39:29):
think at the moment in Manx football is not so great the bad thing in Manx football parents Parents,
parents on the sideline, not just in junior football,
it's starting to creep into, into Manx football as well, into junior,
senior football as well.
I think parents just need to leave, leave their kids to it. Yeah.
Let them, let them develop in the team with their teammates and with their coach.

(39:53):
If you want to go and be a coach, be a coach. But if you want to start shouting
things at your own kids on the sideline, don't bother because it's the worst
thing that could ever happen.
To a kid is having their parents shouting you
know instructions at them they wouldn't go to school they wouldn't walk into
the school classroom would they yeah tell them one plus one equals
three no you know i mean that's the way that's the example i always use yeah

(40:16):
and it infuriates me because you develop in your own way and you develop in
in your your teammates way you know you become a team i've seen kids getting
dragged off at half time by their parents to to have a word on them.
And the rest of the lads are in the changing rooms chatting to the coach and

(40:36):
the coach is giving instructions and they're still outside the changing rooms
getting an earful from the parents.
So yeah, to me, just give it up or go and coach yourselves.
Go and coach another team that doesn't have your kids in it.
There's a lot of coaches out there that do have their own kids in the teams

(40:57):
and they've got the right attitude and they're coaching because they love coaching.
But to me, it's the ones that don't coach. I used to hate that when I was coaching junior football.
It's parents like, I've gone out of my way to go and learn how to teach these
kids how to play football.
Absolutely. You've gone and watched Sky Sports in a pub with your mates on a Saturday afternoon.
It's completely different trying to coach kids than it is to what you see on

(41:21):
the telly. And I get where you're coming from. Parents don't realise.
These kids aren't developed you're developing the kids what you're
watching and what telling them to do is what a developed football
yeah that's at the end of the end of their development
is they're in this stuff yeah stuff that you're expecting
them to do and i you know i
myself i've i've had a son go all the way

(41:42):
through junior football i didn't want to shout things at him i'll have
a little chat to him after the game and ask him you know how how did
how did you think you played yeah and i might mention though well
do you remember when you had the ball here possibly could
could have gone out wide or done this and you know just just a
little chat to them as a parent that's a chat you're having
with your child you know chat to them but it's it's after
the game and i i think that's a good thing to like you know

(42:05):
anyone's day-to-day job you don't go into
work and then your boss sits down and goes you're great
at that you're great at that but then don't ask her a question on
how you can progress if they're doing that they're not managing you are they it's
you know you're just managing their expectation as well because as a parent
you don't want to see them down and upset but you are being realistic with them
at the same time say actually if you've done this it might help you know when

(42:28):
you go oh don't you yeah yeah and that's that's why i never went into coaching
never wanted to go into coaching i did manage corinthians.
First team for a little bit with john
coppel when they were on the verge of getting relegated nick
cowell had done everything he could and he put his hands up and said look i'm
done me and johnny couple dropped in till the end of the season we ended up

(42:50):
staying up we got a little bit of a bit of a thing for it and we thought should
we do it next season and we did we went into the next season signed.
Ross Williamson oh yeah signed Ross Williamson who was an absolute unit and
we thought we thought we're gonna we're gonna win the league with this team
and unfortunately after about you know we had Jamie Stoy playing there and.

(43:13):
Unfortunately after about six or seven
games we were going down to castletown astroturf
on a thursday night yeah at eight
o'clock and there was four or five people there and
me and couple both had young kids and we just went look we can't we can't do
this anymore not for you anymore yeah johnny mack come in and they they managed

(43:36):
to stay up and yeah going back to sorry i'm going back over old ground but that
what What Corinthians then built was unbelievable.
And that team that they had, that have now all pretty much gone to FC Alamant, that was so good.
Luke Murray, Steve Whitley, Sean Doyle. I mean, Sean Doyle is unbelievable.

(43:57):
Seen as a centre-back by some, I heard, but then went in up front for the same
team and ended up scoring 50-odd goals, wasn't it, or something for FC Alamo.
What a player, what a player Luke Murray is.
Luke's just getting back into his football now. I was speaking to him the other
day, and he's gone back to St John's to just enjoy his football again and try and get back into it.

(44:20):
Just to play with his mates and kind of take it a little bit easier.
I think the intensity has caused him a little bit of an issue.
So even now it's causing him a few issues, but he's able to manage it.
And yeah, the quicker we see Luke back in an FC Alleman shirt,
the better. So let's, yeah, hopefully he gets everything sorted.

(44:41):
Yeah, and that's one of them things. So what we'll do is I'll go on to the,
or select seven, which is your seven-a-side team next, all right?
Yeah, we will. We will do that.
This took me ages, by the way. It does. But just so everyone that's listening knows,
we normally end on this this week we're not going to end on it
I'm going to have this select seven and we're going to chat about Craig's Armstrong

(45:02):
foundation as well because it'd be wrong for me to outball here and not do that
so we'll start with your select seven so you know the rules for this don't you
yeah which made it very difficult yeah so it's seven it's a seven aside team
yeah your goalkeeper can either currently be playing or be retired,
you've got to choose three outfield players that are still playing in Manx football

(45:24):
on a Saturday and three that are are retired now that don't play on a Saturday. Yeah.
Your manager can be whoever the hell you want. So we'll start off with your keeper.
Okay. So the goalkeeper, I mentioned him before. Because it's a seven-a-side
team, there's not going to be any crosses, I don't think.
So I'm going to go for Duna. Christian Chalamari was successful at Geordie's.

(45:45):
He played with me at Corinthians for years. I can still hear him shouting, away!
Every time a cross came in because he didn't want to come for it.
But for a seven-a-side team, you need a shot stopper.
And he was definitely a shot stopper, Duna.
And to have him in the dressing room as well, he was such a laugh.
I mean, he's obviously still such a laugh, but I don't get to see him as much

(46:06):
as I would like nowadays.
But when I do, he's still got that same kind of marjorie. And he's a top lad.
He was a great goalkeeper.
There are others that I did think about. You know, Blairo was in that very successful Black Sea team.
But I've gone for Duna, just like I say, seven a side, no crosses.
Fair enough. He doesn't have to come for anything. We'll go with that.

(46:28):
And he might get a drop ball off a tree sometime in the play.
And he's got a pretty decent defence in front of him as well.
Right, so we'll move on to your defence. Okay, we'll go with your first player
that's currently playing still.
So my first player that's currently playing is in defence, and that is Johnny Myers.
He's moved to centre-back now. Now, when he played in midfield,

(46:50):
he was unreal. When he plays up front, he's unreal.
I played a Vets game against him a couple of years back, maybe three years back.
Whenever he turned 35, it was one of his first games. Did he play for Peel?
No, he played for Onken. Was he at Onken? He played for Onken and he scored
a hat-trick or maybe even four.
And he's just, you know, even now, he's pulling St. George's out.

(47:12):
He's Rolls-Royce, isn't he? Yeah. You know, people talk about Rolls-Royces.
Yeah. Yeah. Manx football, he's a Rolls Royce and Manx football.
Yeah. And I remember him when he first came back and he kind of revitalized
that whole St. George's team, him and some others. Yeah, you can't.
We were dominated by St. George's. So, you know, he was always going to be in

(47:33):
my team. A great lad as well.
So who's your next player that's now retired?
So my next player that's now retired is, I'm going to have to go,
I'm going to have to go up top now. Fair enough.
I'll go, where am I going? Where am I going? It's always tough this one.
Yeah. No, I had it in my head and I've lost one of them.

(47:54):
It's Callum. Callum Morrissey.
Again, same as Myers really. Completely revitalised, completely regenerated that team.
He'll tell you how good he was. Oh, he's not shy about that, is he? Yeah.
He probably did it with his sock off as well. He'll tell everyone how good he
is. Well, he's got someone, he's bench-pressed on someone above his head.
But again, another loose, as loose as you can get this fella,

(48:19):
but he was one of the toughest players I ever played against.
And don't get me wrong, I did play, I played against Rick Holden.
I played against Lange and the boys, but I played a lot more against Callum.
So I knew exactly what his strengths and weaknesses were, and there weren't many weaknesses.
And he'll tell you that as well. Yeah. So, yeah, I've gone for Callum, bang up top.

(48:43):
I've got Myers at the back. Duder in that. So we'll go on to your next.
Who's your next current player?
So current player, we've just talked about Luke Murray, so I'm sticking Luke
bang in the middle on his own.
Yeah. Hopefully he doesn't have to do too much and overexert himself.
But, yeah, I'm going for Luke in there. So we'll go with Luke,

(49:03):
yeah? Yeah, Luke in the middle.
He's played up front, he's played out wide, he's played everywhere. He's...
Whatever he is, six foot... Six foot five, six foot six, whatever he is.
I don't know, he's ridiculous.
He reminds me of Ivan Drago from... From Rocky. From Rocky, yeah.
He's just a unit, isn't he? But he's also...

(49:25):
Bloody good football. Technically very good. Technically, I mean,
that overhead kick sums him up.
You know what? You put him, and
I'll probably put Sean Doyle in the same category as Peter Crouch-esque.
You know, you don't really, you think these lads are tall.
They're going to win everything in the end. You don't realise how good they are with their feet.
So talented. And I wouldn't even put, I wouldn't even say he's,
he's not lanky. No. Because he's built like a unit as well.

(49:49):
And he's just, yeah, to me, obviously I work with him. He's on the charity committee.
And he's a good mate of mine but I've not
seen a player like that for for some time yeah
and like I said before the sooner he gets
back into Mags 40 the better because or FC
Alleman anyway the better maybe not at St John's you

(50:11):
never know so we'll move on now who's
your next retired player so next retired player so
the next one is Luntie yeah had to
put Luntian because in my view he was
the best player that I ever played with and some people
will probably say he was the best they ever played against he could
run you ragged he would go you

(50:33):
know when we when we trained on a Thursday night down the NSC
he'd go and put himself centre back so he could just
get the ball off the keeper and then take everyone on and some
would call that selfish but I just called it unbelievable because he would literally
take everyone on all the way through yeah and score and that's what he did and
you know when he when he joined st george's i can't remember how many goals

(50:55):
he'd scored but it was it was up there in 1920 or whatever.
In a in a ridiculous short space of time as well and like i say he would have
gone on to massive things over here if fcl amount would have been a thing back
then he would have definitely been in it because he was to me he was the best
player on the island and the reason why he left corinthians was he wanted to

(51:15):
show that and he wanted to win things.
Unfortunately, I think he only
got to win one trophy maybe. I think it was just before he passed away.
They won one. I'm not sure if he had a season before that or not. I can't remember.
Yeah, I can't. I think it was, I definitely think he won a charity shield.
I can remember seeing a picture of him. Yeah, so maybe it was a charity shield

(51:35):
and then they won the one around Easter time, whichever one that was.
The FA Cup, isn't it? And then unfortunately he passed away and we thought they
might win the next trophy and they got beat on the day by Royals.
Yeah. Which was massive shock, wasn't it?
Was that the team with Jay Carver? But that had the team with Jamie Caron as
well. So yeah, God bless him.
So, you know, fair play to them boys on the day. They turned up.

(51:59):
They took them to it and they beat them on the day. A massive shock.
I think it was a big Manx football shock. That was definitely.
Massive, was it? I remember the man must have been absolutely rocking.
I bet it was, yeah. Goff has told me some stories about it. Yeah.
Yeah, the boys loved all that. So we'll move on now to your final current player.
Okay, my final current player is, I'm calling him current, and he is technically

(52:25):
still current, but it's Chris Cannell.
Yeah, he's still out injured and he's still registered, so I'm saying he's still current.
I don't know whether he will be current for much longer because his knees are
gone, but what a player. What a player.
You could stick him centre-back, you could stick him left-back,

(52:47):
centre-mid, left-mid, anywhere.
Where maybe not up front but I went
down when I did go down the first season to watch FC Isle
of Man when he never played it was a completely different game when he did play
he dominated whoever came up against him It's always been like that I'm in the
same year as Cannell at school and we grew up together through school even on the tennis courts at St.

(53:13):
Ninnans up at school now even there on break time he
wouldn't have have any hesitation to
throw you into that fence with his shoulder you know that desire to
win a ball yeah and you say tennis court you probably could pick a tennis racket
up a badminton racket yeah a golf club no he's one of them yeah he loves which
is what Lundy was Lundy was the same he'd pick any kind of sport up but I mean

(53:34):
he made John Coppels the same picks anything up and dead good at it yeah and
it really winds me up well it's it really winds me up but yeah Cannell,
he's in there at the back with Myers so I've gone with a with a one a two.
A one in the middle and then i'm going for three attacking players so i've got
lunty on my left yeah call him up top your last one your last retired and my

(53:56):
last one is steve glover god bless him stay another super talented player i
would put him in the same milk as lunty on on on his day.
Not as reliable to turn up some games. But again, that was the Corinthian ilk back in the day.

(54:16):
But when he was on his game, you know, again, he left, went to St.
Mary's, played for a few clubs.
I think he went and won a Gold Cup at Pulley as well, didn't he? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And he was just such a great lad, such a great lad. And he knew where the net was.
He knew how to hold a ball up as well. He could hold you off.
He could hold anyone off.

(54:38):
But he was just such a talent and such a likeable lad.
And while we're on the subject of Steve Glover, I think we should mention some
of the charities on the island.
You know, I'll listen and stand up to suicide and things like that.
If there are lads out there that do struggle, well, not just lads out there
that do struggle, but, you know, Steve was a prime example of that.

(55:00):
Always happy as Larry, always.
Anytime you didn't know what was going on behind the scenes.
Always fantastic to see. I'd seen him on the boat a few months before he passed
away or a few weeks before he passed away.
And I hadn't seen him for so long and it was great to see him.
And we had a little bit of an interaction on the boat.
And then when I heard the news, it was devastating.

(55:21):
And I mentioned Baby Driver before, it's devastated his life.
And I think some people forget that.
And I think we need to kind of say to people out there, listen to these charities, speak up.
Don't be afraid to speak up. Don't be afraid to speak up. It's better then,
you know. Everyone has their struggles.
You've got to talk about some point. It's going to help. When Craig died,

(55:44):
we all went through that.
A lot of us went through that. But we had a very good...
Social side of things at the time and i think
that's what got a lot of us through it because we could
go the pub together we could talk about it together we could cry together
about it and you know crying years ago
was seen as you know a man crying was seen

(56:05):
as you know a weakness yeah but a man crying is just an emotion that everyone
has and i really wanted to get that out there tonight is you know i've picked
steve not not for that reason i've picked steve because he was such a good player
but steers also shocked a lot of people from what happened and i just wanted to.

(56:25):
To to kind of say to people you know as bad
as you think it could be there's people out there there's charities out there
and they're doing such a fantastic job but i met two two irish ladies from the
from the stand up to cancer a few a few months ago and they were brilliant they
did They did a stand-up presentation on it all and they're just so keen to help.

(56:47):
And like you say, the help's out there. So yeah, just wanted to get that out there.
It's a great message to get out there as well, especially like the audience
that we have is, you know, it is lads.
It's, you know, there's a few being, the majority are local lads that play football.
And I guarantee there'll be someone listening to this that is struggling,
but they probably won't admit it.
So it's a great message to get out there, mate. And I fully agree with that.

(57:09):
So what we'll do is now is, I just want to know who manages that team. Me?
I'm managing it. Yeah. Yeah. Cause I put it together, so I'm going to manage
it. But you said you hated coaching. No, they're going to turn up to training
these lot, you see. Oh, right.
Is that why you picked them? Yeah. It's the only reason you picked them,
really, is it? Cause you know that's right. No, I'm only joking.
I'm only joking. It's gotta be, for me, Chris Bass, senior.

(57:31):
He caused a massive stir when he, when he was sacked at FCL, a man, listen, the,
They went their separate ways. Yeah, they went their separate ways.
FC Allemagne was successful.
You know, Barcy, some people may say it's old school coaching,
but he knew how to drill a team.
I can still hear Chris Feeney going, set, set, set.

(57:52):
And that's all he used to shout at each other. And it was all pre-planned.
You know, the way they played tactically was all, you know, it was all down to him.
And yeah Chris Bath Chris Bath Senior is the manager.
Chris Bath Junior what a player by the way it's Sonal it's
Sonal probably following his footsteps I don't think any of their

(58:14):
basses you know I think Andy's got away from it a bit with his
cycling but Chris and Nick will always somehow find their
way back into football yeah absolutely when he's not cutting hedges he'll yeah
or a slum offer yeah do you know yeah but yeah that's another subject yeah I
hope he's doing alright he's alright now he's playing against against George
he played up front for all boys he's a backing thing and beat St.

(58:37):
George's so he loves doing that got to his dad's house after it straight away
you know he has his dad was down actually watching so his dad would hate that
but no so I thought we'd see him backing coaching actually I did think when St.
George's was struggling we might see yeah I've seen it but I think it's probably
just zapped him you know you've seen Jürgen Klopp get zapped at Liverpool now

(58:59):
from putting all that energy into it I spoke to Senior not too long ago when
I was just chatting to him. I was at a game watching it with him.
And he said to me, he said, you know what he enjoys now? He's got the grandkids.
Yeah. And what he does, he splits his time. So if Chris is playing one week,
he'll go watch Chris. If Nick's playing the other week, he'll go and he'll alternate between them.
Yeah. And he has a time with the grandkids while they're at that game.
So like last week, he had his whole tribe there.

(59:20):
Yeah, yeah. Everyone was there. But it was like a crash running around for him.
But after that, you know, it's one of them. And I think he's just enjoying the time.
Ah, special times for him then. Yeah. He just enjoys it. So,
Healy, that was your football stuff.
I can't not have you on and talk about the charity. You know,
Craig's Heart and Strong Foundation.
It's easy to say but it's

(59:43):
saved lives so many lives already you know it's not been around for a long time
in the wider scheme of things yeah yeah you know compared to other charities
but the work you guys have done not just in football you know it started through
football it did the passion came through football and that's how it started off yeah but,
now across the island you know your screenings they sell out well they don't

(01:00:05):
sell out the bookings go pretty much instantly don't they you announce it on
oh they're going up at 4 o'clock on this day they're gone by 10 past 4 at the
latest and that's on a bad day I think it was 8 minutes the first one it's mad.
Let's go how do you go from losing such a good friend as Craig to thinking we

(01:00:28):
need to do something to raise awareness of this and develop this charity that
part of things was down to the family and you know Keith Keith, Paula,
Hayley, and Dean, they kind of got us all together and said,
look, we're thinking of doing something.
We want to do something in his memory. And it was pretty instant.
It was only weeks after that they come up with this idea and we all met around the kitchen table.

(01:00:54):
It was just going to be to raise awareness of these conditions that Craig had.
Because when we found out Craig had this condition and it was hereditary and
everything else, we'd never heard of it.
And then all of a sudden, Craig's grandmother, bless her, she would get sent
all these paper, all these cut-ins from the UK newspapers and things.

(01:01:15):
And they were all getting sent across to her saying, oh, look,
it's happened. It's happened here. It's happened here.
And we'd never heard of it because they kind of said at the time it was all one in a million.
Craig's condition is one in a million. Now, since we've been screening,
we've found, I think it's five or six people that have got the same condition
Craig had that are not related to him.
Yeah. So the stats nowadays that Crye put out are 12 people a week die of an

(01:01:39):
undiagnosed heart defect in the UK.
So it's a huge killer.
I think they used to put it down to like adult sudden death or they called it
adult cop death because they didn't really know what was going on.
They didn't understand it.
These people just didn't wake up. Yeah, but now the research is out there and
Cardiac Risk and the Young are doing so much of it that you are getting these

(01:02:00):
results and you are able to screen and find them.
So, like I say, it was just going to be awareness for these conditions to start with.
And we were getting a lot of money in and kind of not having anything to spend it on.
So, Keith Lunt's brother is a doctor, Jeff, Dr. Jeff Lunt.

(01:02:20):
I think he puts Botox in the women nowadays. He used to actually do the medical stuff.
Yeah, but he was a medical doctor. And he said to Keith and the family,
there's this charity in the UK called Cardiac Risk in the Young.
Why don't you give them a shout? Because this is what they're doing.
So we gave them a shout and we got them over to the island to do a hard screening.

(01:02:43):
And we literally didn't really know what we were doing.
They came over with all their technicians. missions and the first
one was in the palace i went to one in the palace that'd be
to one in the sefton i think yeah so so the very first
one was in the palace and we had to we had to build this cage and
throw curtains over it and things you know for cubicles yeah
so the fact that we're in the hospital now makes it so much

(01:03:04):
better and so much easier because you're going for a
medical test in a medical facility so but this was you were going through the
star wars barn you were sticking to the floor and yeah i remember it because
i remember going it's dead dark in there like it was it was just a horrible
room really to to have to go in and have a medical test done so.

(01:03:26):
But this went on for years in in the hotels but
the very first one danny oram actually came to i think
he was 17 when he came and all of a sudden we
were just on the little reception area and all of a sudden the doctor
came out and he was you need to ring this guy's parents
and get his parents here and get his family here and we
were all kind of blown away by it no one kind of knew what was

(01:03:48):
going on anyway his parents came down and cut
a long story short he had a huge hole in his heart i think
the doctor said the biggest one he'd ever seen at the time so
danny was like our first big first one we ever found
yeah and you know in the
couple of years after that he was he was treated and he
had his heart massive heart operation to

(01:04:10):
fill it in and now he's top possibly top goal scorer in the alaman premier league
all those years on so to me that that's that's what we kind of set it up for
and that that's kind of what it's done so it was it was more of a case of.
Let's test let's test it and see how it goes and

(01:04:31):
that one went obviously so successfully successfully that we
tweak a little bit of little bit of things every year to make
it run a little bit smoother it's like we talked about
the start of podcast isn't it really yeah you can't not do
something and not go for the improvement yeah and as the
years have gone on like i say we've moved to to the better
facilities up at the hospital now now we craig's

(01:04:54):
heart strong we just sit outside and give out free
water bottles and show people where they're going and just have
a chat to them really because the cardiac risk
and the young guys are in there they're in the sweet day and they're doing everything
yeah and we find out the results at the end of the weekend and and that is what
we want if we didn't want to have to you know collect data and things like that

(01:05:16):
and obviously with data protection nowadays anyway it's it's mad but we're not.
So we're now, you know, after starting off with that one, I'm catching Danny
in the first year, we're now, we've screened over 10,000, or we've done over
10,000 screenings now and found over 360-odd problems.
It's mad, isn't it? I know a couple of people that have had them.

(01:05:37):
I mean, if both of us, Jonathan Bradley.
Yeah, yeah. Do you know? Yeah, Bradley was, he was 35 and thought,
I've been tested before, but I'll just go anyway. Yeah, that's the last one he could go to.
Last one he could ever go to. and they had to restart his heart and it didn't
work actually the first time, did it?
They didn't do that at the screening, by the way, if anyone's thinking that's
what goes on at the screening.

(01:05:57):
He was found with a problem and had to get referred and he's now,
I mean, I haven't seen him for a while actually.
I've seen him, I was away with him two weeks ago, three weeks ago about until
the people of Arsenal with him.
Okay, so he's still... So he can walk about, he managed to get round London
and he managed to drink, so yeah, he's doing all right.
Oh, that's good, that's good. Still an awful football though.

(01:06:18):
So you got injured when we were away.
Oh, right. Okay. So that tells you about everything you need to know about it. It does. It does.
So, yeah. So we, again, we got a few years in and the money was just coming
up. We were only doing one screening a year.
So we now do two. Yeah. And it's the biggest screening that Cry do around the whole of the UK.

(01:06:38):
It's mental to think that. What were we in Ireland? 88,000 people.
And they've got the whole of the UK. They've got the whole of the UK.
But the Isle of Man screening is the biggest one. and they do you know
we screen just under 400 people every time
we do it over a weekend find we
find people every time so there's always there's always people being found
we then again had

(01:07:00):
so much money that we didn't know what to spend it on and fabrice moamba
collapsed at spurs yeah and i was in here
watching in this all we're at all boys clubhouse for
anyone that's why we record these i was in here watching that
that night so we i seen that on the telly so i remember and that
that stuck in our head and it was kind of a light bulb moment kind
of went we should buy defibs yeah for

(01:07:23):
all the football teams on the island let's do that and
that that went from football teams to rugby clubs to and
then it just spread out from there and you know we've we've donated the last
five that we've we've got some fundraising in and the lady annette kindly bought
us five defibs recently we bought the boxes and they've all been distributed
around the island now which we're about to launch hopefully we get them all

(01:07:46):
launched in february which puts us up to.
570 defibs around the island look at this the space of this island that's got
to be the most defibs per like square meter i think it's got anywhere it's i
would go as far to say it's anywhere in the world because you look at that on a small space,
like the Isle of Man, the amount of area that's actually rural and not covered

(01:08:08):
anyways, you know, round up, that's a fantastic achievement,
isn't it? Yeah, no, it's brilliant.
And like I've always said, you know, we couldn't do it without the support of
the Manx public because some people just do fundraising for us off their own back.
We have our own fundraisers ourselves, which I'll tell you about our next one

(01:08:28):
in a minute, but it's actually sold out, unfortunately, so nobody else can join us.
But without that support, we wouldn't be able to do it.
And when we do get, you know, the funds up to a certain amount.
Because we always like to keep three years worth of heart screenings,
because those heart screenings cost us £27,500 each weekend that we do.

(01:08:50):
So you're talking, it's £54,000 a year, the two heart screenings. Yeah.
And we have to keep a contingency there for the next few years.
Because without the heart screenings, you know,
know we're not here to give defibs out on the island we're here to heart to
screen hearts but as an additional you
know bonus to the charity really when we do

(01:09:12):
have additional funds we go out and we buy a bunch of
defibs and stick them out and like i say that the
next ones that are going out we've got some really good places that they're going
to and we're dead happy and proud about
them again yeah it's what you need it's just
what you need mate isn't it yeah go out out everywhere send them out do
what you need to do yeah in an ideal world world there

(01:09:33):
should be one on every street corner and you know every we're never
going to get we're never going to get there we're never going to get we'll do
what is what you've done as well is like for
people that don't know the map as well yeah the
support you've had for that and where that's mapped as well and
yeah people can see where they are that's a massive massive credit
to dave scambler the ambulance service because he

(01:09:54):
pushed that for years and years and he put so much
work into it came came came across so much red tape and eventually we got it
done and if you go on that map now which is um defibs.im so it's www.defibs.im
you can zoom in on the map and see where all the defibs are and the green ones
are all the public access ones that the ambulance service will tell you about.

(01:10:17):
And the orange ones are the ones that are inside an office and available during
certain times so if you've got
a defib and you don't know whether you've registered it or not have a look,
and if it's not registered get it registered because it could someone could
collapse outside your work you've got one inside that's not registered the ambulance
service won't send anyone in there but if you've got it registered and it's

(01:10:38):
between nine and five or whatever times you've put on there they'll send them
in yeah say go in go in this office here and go get theirs,
and then the the chance of survival goes from something like 20 70 80 90 just
because you've got a defib handy so we won't stop with the defibs if we've if
we've got the fund and we won't stop and we'll put when we hit a thousand i'll be i'll be very happy.

(01:11:05):
But you know 570 at the moment still
going that we're happy with that yeah and what I'll do is when I put this podcast
out I'll put the link to that on as well so people can see it and see yeah brilliant
it's nice and easy to find I'll put the link to Craig's website as well the
foundation yeah so we mentioned the fundraisers yeah can't not have you in and
talk about some of them have been legendary over the years yeah we've had some absolute belters I mean,

(01:11:27):
we've got a lot of Liverpool connections so the fact that we've had quite a
lot of Liverpool dinners John Aldridge,
John Barnes Souness. I would assume Souness.
Jamie Carragher was just, that was unreal. That was unreal.
But then we've had Big Dunk. Yeah. Again, another, you know,
we've had the boys from Soccer Saturday.
In the early days, we had Bobby Charlton. Yeah. No, sorry, Bobby Robson in the

(01:11:51):
early days. Bobby Robson came over.
And Peter Shilton. You know, these are proper legends of the game that we've had. Yeah.
Unfortunately, we've kind of built it up every year.
We're running out. We're running out of that type of footballer now because
we've had a lot of them, but we've got ideas for this year. We're hoping to have a ball this year.

(01:12:13):
We're not quite there yet, so we've not put anything together yet.
We're still trying to get a good enough player over.
I think the last time, the last two years that we've done it,
we've had three players because we're trying to, without getting that one calibre
of player, you have to get three of them together or something like that.
You've got to have a bit of camaraderie on the beach to engage everyone,

(01:12:36):
basically. Yeah, absolutely.
So we're working on something this year. But in the meantime,
we've gone for a golf day on the, I think it's the 10th of May.
Yeah. We've got a golf day down at Ramsey. All the teams are booked up and we've
got ex-Liverpool players, Bruce Grobbelaar, Phil Thompson, John Aldridge and Alan Kennedy.
So some real big trophy winners in there.

(01:12:58):
John Aldridge, Phil Thompson, we've actually had over before.
Phil's actually a good friend of mine now and helps me out with a lot of things.
He helped me out with the Carrick dinner all those years ago.
So I've got, I've, I'll, I've got personal thing with John Aldridge.
Like he was fantastic way.
Not many people know my dad was ill and John sent a video message and do you
know what, it was one of the last things he had me and it was fantastic.

(01:13:21):
I've still got a message on my phone. I still got a video.
Yeah. John, do you know what John's unbelievable and he made it that personal
as well. Like he is fantastic.
Yeah. Off the pitch. Yeah. Well, he's yeah, he's over in May.
He's helped us out with a few bits and bobs over the years as well.
So the top guys, Bruce Grabalar was from that legendary 80s.
He's got to make sure he doesn't have a piss on in the golf course.

(01:13:41):
Yeah, that 86 FA Cup final is like one of my first ever memories of football.
So to have him as well and Kennedy, a European Cup winner, it's just a fantastic event.
See how good they are on the golf course. They all talk about it going down
form, being playing, don't they?
They do, don't they? yeah we'll see about that but can they do

(01:14:03):
it in ramsey on a sunday friday afternoon yeah yeah we'll see about that but
yeah there's a bit of a bit of food afterwards and they're going to do a q a
and everything else there and we're hopefully going to raise a shed load of
money for for craig's heartstrong and uh the sponsors there doug skinner from kenya can skinner yeah.

(01:14:24):
Cedar alex bernett cedar standard bank peter
dixon and the boys at standard bank and uh we've
got man crane hire as well yeah which is
very nice of them to come to come forward as well
and and a guy that's actually been affected by by
heart problems as well over the years so yeah we're we're really i don't play

(01:14:44):
golf no so this golf day is something that's it's so new to me but i've got
a lot of golfer friends that are going to help out and put things together for
you just walk around and push a bike yeah a little caddy for the day i won't
be walking anyway i'll I'll have a little.
Is that this game when you did the contract, was it? I've already booked a caddy, yeah.
A little buggy. A little buggy for the day, yeah. Oh, part of the T's and C's

(01:15:06):
when you say, we'll use your golf course, but can I have a buggy?
That is definitely the T's and C's, mate, yeah.
Or we'll be taking the bottles of Budweiser for them all. Right, yeah.
Around the course. A little cooler on the back. Yeah, yeah. So that's exciting for us.
And like I say, hopefully we raise a lot of cash and that cash goes straight
back into the Allemand community as always.
And that's what you need, mate, isn't it? So that's everything, isn't it, mate?

(01:15:28):
You know, we've covered everything here. We've covered your football,
what we think about Manx 40.
That seven-a-side team that I don't think anyone would ever want to play against.
The charity, the fantastic work you guys do, I can't praise it enough.
You know, I've had a couple of screenings with you.
If you get the opportunity and you're in the age group, I would 100% recommend

(01:15:48):
getting them screenings.
It's 20 minutes of your life that could save your life at the end of the day.
Like, you know, you go in, shave your chest if you've gone in before because
it fucking hurts when they rip the stuff off.
But after that, it's fantastic, you know.
It's what the workers are doing, the work you've done for the community.
Especially the footballing community, you know, everything. I can't thank you enough, mate.

(01:16:10):
I appreciate it. And it's been
a fantastic thing. So we've got a great committee behind us now as well.
We've got, there's 10 of us on that committee now, so I'm getting help from all angles.
And you're getting the drive and, you know, different ideas as well to drive
that forward. Can't, can't ever be a bad thing. Yeah.
Yeah. No, appreciate it. So Healy, thank you very much for your time tonight,
mate. It's been a belter of a podcast and yeah.

(01:16:32):
Cheers, mate. Thanks for having me. Cheers. Cheers, mate.
Thank you.
Music.

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