Cork City FC is in mourning following the death this morning of Noelle Feeney in Marymount Hospice.
The word 'legend' is thrown around an awful lot in sport these days. That cliché is also probably overused, but it rings true when it comes to Noelle Feeney.
Anyone who's stepped inside Turner's Cross since the current club was founded will have seen Noelle in some shape or form.
Four years after the club was founded in 1984, she joined the Cork City Official Supporters Group. Over the next 25 years she would spearhead it.
But she was more than a supporter. Before the days of official stores, if you wanted to buy a piece of club merchandise, you would call up the Pearse Road in Ballyphehane to Noelle's house and her front room would be stacked with scarves, jerseys, hats, tickets or whatever you wanted.
On the pitch her impact was felt by the City players regardless of where they were playing. Noelle would stand outside the dressing room with a bottle of holy water and bless them before they came out onto the pitch. Not just in Ireland, but in Munich, Israel, Moscow and everywhere they went.
Appointed to the board of directors in 1997, she had been awarded a Southside & District Special Lifetime Achievement award just two weeks ago. In January 2005, she was named as one of the Sunday Times top ten women in football.
Her contribution is best summed up from a Cork City programme later that same year, written by Cork librarian Gerry Desmond:
She has blessed the team with Holy Water on dreary Saturdays at Finn Park and scorching afternoons in far away Haifa; she has prepared the oranges and drinks at a thousand training sessions; she organises refreshments for officials and dignitaries on match day; she looks after the ball boys and the mascots; she spent years running buses to away games; she takes the team on regular hospital and school visits; she’s done the half time draws and the Christmas raffles; she has washed the gear; she has joined the board; she has cleaned up when everyone has gone; she has designed the new scarves and ordered the new badges; she has been priest and confessor to half the players who have worn the colours; she has cried when we’ve won and cried when we’ve lost; she has kept the office going; she has printed players’ names on countless shirts for wide-eyed kids; she has answered ten thousand letters; she has been on the phone more than any politician; she has been the glue that’s kept it all together when things were bleakest; she has added the personal touch that every club should have and none can buy; she has travelled countless miles to be with her boys; she has done a million other things I am not even aware of.
She passed away as she lived: A true Cork City legend.
