Georginio Wijnaldum is an absolute legend in our eyes as it has emerged that he has done something extremely sound for a young lad from Limerick, completely off the cuff.
11-year-old Paddy Mackessy was over in Liverpool to watch his favourite team beat Middlesbrough 3-0, and the next day while he and his mum were out shopping in the city, he bumped into the Dutch footballer.
Like something out of a film, Paddy was eyeing up a pair of ridiculously expensive football boots, when Wijnaldum came up behind him and asked him if he liked them.
Soon, the young lad was leaving the shop with a brand new pair of Adidas PureControl boots worth around £300, and an incredible memory that he will keep for ever.
His mother Louise told the story to Ray D'Arcy RTE Radio 1 on Monday [via Independent.ie]:
We went into the Adidas store and Paddy just went and bought a pair of skinny pants, and of course being a typical Irish mammy, I went 'come on so' because he would stay looking at soccer stuff all day if you let him.
I was like 'come on, come on' and so we came out of the shop and he said 'I got a selfie with him' and I was like 'oh brilliant' and he said they started chatting about the soccer boots. "He said to Paddy 'do you like those boots?' And Paddy said 'I do'.
He said 'what size are you?' and he said 'size five' and he was like 'why don't you buy them?' And Paddy was like 'they're so expensive'.
At that stage I had called him and we left the store and Paddy was telling me this and we walked out into the city and we literally just looked behind and the lady from the store had ran after us and she said 'listen, can you come back to the store? He wants to buy Paddy the boots'.
He only went in for a pair of skinny pants, outstanding.
That is exactly the type of thing a) We dreamt that a pro footballer would do for us as a kid, and b) Exactly what we like to think we would do all the time if we were a top-level footballer. Fantastic stuff from Wijnaldum.
Of course, young Paddy caught him at a really good time as the Dutchman was surely still on a high from scoring the opening goal as Liverpool sealed Champions League qualification.
Still, what a top bloke.
