soccer

Let Us Shout Joyfully

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“O come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our maker. For He is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the sheep under his care.” In Psalms 95, the current generation of Hebrews is exhorted to declare Yahweh as their god, or suffer the fate of the previous generation who did not believe and were left to die in the wilderness during the exodus: a wrathful Yahweh declares, “They shall not enter My rest” (Enduring Word). After ten years in the wilderness of the Scottish league minor divisions, Glasgow Rangers are again champions and the Rangers faithful are shouting joyfully – here is Sandy Row on the hoarding around the site of the old Gilpin’s shoe shop and the UFF funeral volley mural.

See previously Order Restored (which will link to even more posts).

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X09087 X09090 X09091 [X09086] [X09088] [X09089] the battles we refuse to fight today become the hardships our children must endure tomorrow

The Orange State

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The orange lily began appearing in murals with some frequency in the mid-2000s (with one earlier appearance in Londonderry; compare this to posts with orange lilies at Peter Moloney – Murals and at Extramural Activity). It became part of the logo of the Orange Order in 2007 – see Design Research Group – and there was an attempt to re-brand the Twelfth as “Orangefest” (Irish Times). It is used in this centenary celebration board to make it clear that Northern Ireland was created as a Protestant and unionist state.

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X09093 X09092 Sandy Row

‘The Glory Continues’ Continues

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Martin O’Neill took Celtic – and about 80,000 fans (ESPN) – to the UEFA Cup in 2003, losing in extra time to FC Porto of Portugal. This mural off Friendly Street in the Markets – which shows the Champions Cup rather than the UEFA Cup – is still rolling in 2022. Peter Moloney took a picture of it in 2006.

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The Beautiful Game

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This Tigers Bay house is showing its support for soccer teams in all territories and at all levels: Rangers from Glasgow, Scotland; Northern Ireland internationally; Liverpool from England; and local team Crusaders.

For the UDA memorial garden to the left, see Honur, Loyalty, Liberty, Sacrifice. The remembrance day board was also seen in east Belfast.

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Order Restored

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Rangers went into administration in 2012 and the “new” club played in the 4th tier of Scottish football. After four years, they had played themselves back into premiership football. Ten years after their previous league championship, they topped the table at the end of the 2020-2021 season, prompting the board shown above “order restored”. See also: 55 | F*ck Your Ten In A Row | Blues Brothers | We’re Back (and Legends Never Die).

The area in front of the Tiger’s Bay Flute Band mural bears an “Anfield Road’ street sign; and there is a Chelsea FC crest on the house across the street (not shown).

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X08859 [X08860] X08863 X08861 [X08862] watp we are the people

H&W Welders

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Titanic was built at Harland & Wolff shipyard in east Belfast; it took more than three years to build but was in service for only five days, as it famously hit an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic ocean. The welders formed their own football club, in 1965. The football and hockey players on the right are perhaps associated with Ledley Hall.

The final image is of the piece in 2014.

Cluan Place, east Belfast.

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Football For All

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Cumann Spóırt An Phobaıl (Fb | ig) is an all-abilities (and all-ages – starting at age 5) soccer club based on the Ballymurphy Road in west Belfast. The club was profiled in the Irish News in late 2020. “CSP Abú”

The murals are in Springhill Avenue; for the community mural at the blind end of the road, see Inspire, Uphold, And Make Happy; for the pro-Palestinian murals, see Grasping The Barb, David And Goliath and Over Time.

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X08847 X08848 [X08846] justice for noah

Glory Days

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Henrik Larsson left Glasgow Celtic for Barcelona in 2004, after scoring 174 goals in 221 appearances (WP), but he replaced Katie Taylor as an inspiration to the kids at Victoria Nursery in the New Lodge. (Her faded right shoulder is still visible in the bottom left corner of the image below; for the whole thing, see School Of Champions.)

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Do The Bouncy

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The “S”s are “5”s in the Union Bears sticker in the top right corner, to give “5uper Ranger5”, in celebration of Glasgow Rangers’ 55th Scottish League title (see e.g. 55). At home stadium Ibrox, fans “do the bouncy” – which means jumping up and down (youtube) – much like “pogo” dancing or as children do on a “bouncy castle”; hire firm ‘Bouncy Castle Madness’ (Fb) has been advertising heavily in Belfast and their sticker is on the left. The final sticker celebrates the centenary of Northern Ireland, 1921-2021 (see e.g. The Centenary Of Oppression or We Will Take Nothing Less).

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The Gaffer

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This is an update to the post Legends Never Die, which showed the original tribute to Rangers manager Walter Smith in the form of a tarp below the celebration of Rangers’ 2020-2021 league title. Since then, fans have left wreaths and attached their tops to the railings, with messages written on them in marker: “True Blue”, “Our knight”, “Legend like no other”, “Mr Rangers”.

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X08792 X08793 [X08789] [X08791] X08794 X08795 X08790 Lawnbrook Ave