THEY’RE AWAY WITH THE FAIRIES
Did you go over the Fairy Bridge on the way from the airport? If you didn’t say ‘hello fairies’, you’re in trouble.”
FourFourTwo have been inside FC Isle of Man’s boardroom for a matter of minutes, and we’ve just been given a dire warning by one of the locals.
“You’ve had it,” their manager Chris Bass interjects, breaking off from writing out tonight’s team-sheet to join the conversation with a mischievous smile. “If the plane starts rattling on the way back, it’ll be because of the fairies…”
We’ve arrived on an island that’s steeped in folklore, and suspect we’ve just heard one of the most well-worn tales of all, delivered with a friendly grin to wind up visitors from the mainland. Tonight, though, a new story is ready to be written on the Isle of Man – one that those inside this boardroom hope will be passed from generation to generation.
For the first time, the island has a team in England’s non-league system, and around 2,000 people are expected to witness this moment of history for FC Isle of Man in their first campaign. Their inaugural home match against Brocton in the North West Counties League has finally arrived, after more than a year of waiting.
BROCTON, VIA GREENLAND AND KURDISTAN
“It’s your lucky day,” the man in the driving seat tells FFT, as we traverse the roads of Douglas, the island’s pretty seaside capital.
“You’ve got the Isle of Man’s record scorer and their record appearance-maker as your taxi driver.”
“IRELAND WOULD BE A FASTER ROUTE TO A HIGHER LEVEL, BUT ENGLAND IS MORE ROMAN TIC”
By chance, we’ve climbed into the cab of Peter Langridge – and having learned why we’ve turned up, he doesn’t need a second invitation to tell us about his heyday, playing for the island’s long-standing representative team in the 1990s and early 2000s.
“I scored against Manchester City, and we beat Burnley,” he says. “English clubs always used to come over for friendly matches in the summer, but then the games stopped. I don’t know why. It was sad.”
Located in the Irish Sea, almost equidistant from Cumbria, north Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland, the Isle of Man is 32 miles long with a population of just over 80,000. It’s accessible by regular planes and ferries from the mainland – its proximity to Liverpool explains why many locals
