‘You come to a certain age when these things aren’t your friend anymore’ – Paul Howard on wearing the sports jersey

Paul Howard is listing off the things no man or woman over the age of 40 should ever be caught wearing – “Converse, hoodies, combat trousers” – when he comes promptly to the sports jersey, “and definitely not the sports jersey, one hundred per cent”, he says.

Being over that age Howard is naturally including himself, despite his long and enduring love affair with the sports jersey, especially the Liverpool one.

“Every new football season I go into Lifestyle Sports, look at the Liverpool jersey, and think ‘God, I’d love that’,” he says. “So I buy it, occasionally wear it at home when watching a match, but I would never wear it outside. Not flattering, more sarcastic.”

Howard, however, will make one exception: Friday being Goal jersey day, which calls on communities across Ireland to wear their chosen sports jersey and support Goal’s work with vulnerable communities, he’s been pulling out some of his old favourites and revisiting those times he always wore them with pride.

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“My first ever jersey was the O’Neill’s replica Liverpool jersey, so it wasn’t the one you saw players wearing on the telly. It came as a kit, the jersey wrapped around cardboard, these kind of silky shorts, and these incredibly thick socks, the white foot part about twice as thick as the main body of the sock.

“I got the away kit colours, from 1982, 1983, which was yellow with red pin stripes, and actually looked like pyjamas. You had a choice of long or short sleeves, and I got the long sleeves, because Ronnie Whelan used to do this thing when he scored a Goal, he’d put his sleeve down over the hand, and put his hand up in the air. Ronnie Whelan was my hero back then, and I just wanted to be like him, playing out on the road.

I remember trying to get Liam Brady to sign it, and it took me about nine attempts, then one day he finally said yes

“I don’t know what fabric it was, but I seemed to lose half a stone running around in that thing. Years later I got the Ireland football jersey they wore for the Euro 88 qualifiers, and for me that jersey has never been bettered, the three adidas stripes down the sleeve, and always reminds me of Mark Lawrenson scoring at Hamden Park. That was the campaign our luck changed, and I wanted that jersey.

“I was quite a malnourished teenager until around 16, when I suddenly put on weight, then I had to drag the jersey on. It just didn’t fit any more.”

Not that he was finished with it yet. “So I started using it to collect autographs, up to sometime around Italia 90. And I got pretty much every Irish player from that era to sign it, it was my pride and joy.

“I had everyone, Tony Galvin, Tony Grealish, Frank Stapleton, David O’Leary, Tony Cascarino. Some were harder to get that others. John Aldridge always stopped. I remember trying to get Liam Brady to sign it, and it took me about nine attempts, then one day he finally said yes. Even when he said no it was a thrill that he said anything to me.

“Then I lost it one day, dropped it leaving a match from Lansdowne Road, just suddenly realised it was gone. I was devastated, that was the thrill of having a jersey in those days.”

Long before hitting 40 Howard also realised that wearing a jersey wasn’t always acceptable everywhere.

“When I started going to matches not as a fan, as a sportswriter, so you stopped dressing up as fan. I remember Johnny Lyons, who we all loved and miss so much, wore a Dutch jersey to a Mick McCarthy press conference, ahead of a game in Amsterdam, and Johnny was fanatical about Dutch football. Mick told him to take it off or leave. He liked Johnny too, but just couldn’t look at him sitting there in a Dutch jersey.”

He has some other old favourites, and with that goes digging around his wardrobe to find not just a jersey but a statement.

“Some of the older retro jerseys I’d consider fashion items. I bought the DDR jersey, from the 1974 World Cup, which was dark with a white V-neck, with the crest of the DDR. I absolutely love that, though I was out one night when someone took a picture of me wearing it, and I thought that’s not doing anything for me

“Some of those jerseys from the 1970s, the Peru jersey from the 1978 World Cup, which had a red sash, the Scotland 1986 World Cup jersey, which was very nice too.

“The other one I really loved was the Liverpool jersey when they won the Champions League in 2005. I wore that for a few matches, but these days they’re only worn in the sittingroom when I’m watching matches on my own, screaming at the television. My wife Mary wouldn’t be sitting with me, because I’d be getting too worked up.

“They don’t change that much from year to year, just minor tweaks, it’s hard to see what’s the point, other than gouging money out of fans.”

Whatever about the Liverpool strip, the chances of finding Howard wearing an Ireland rugby jersey is properly slim.

I also know Ross says the Irish rugby jersey has not been the same since the collar disappeared, that’s what really made it a fashion item

“Because I also write Ross O’Carroll-Kelly, I’d be too ashamed to be seen in it, I’ve spent so many years sending up rugby culture. I had a friend who professed to hating Irish rugby, but would wear a Leinster jersey if he was going out. He thought he’d have a better chance of meeting girls if he was wearing a Leinster jersey.

“Watch back matches from around 2000, 2001, the jerseys are so big players look like they’re swimming in them. Almost comically big. The idea now is the jersey is a sort of second skin, harder to grab on to, which seems such a logical thing.

“I also know Ross says the Irish rugby jersey has not been the same since the collar disappeared, that’s what really made it a fashion item. Wearing the collar up was the real statement, especially in a nightclub, when they’d nearly take the eye out of you, they’d be so starched up. Without the collar, they can’t really be worn on a night out any more.

“For Goal jersey day, it’s about wearing it into offices, into schools, there is still so much banter around sport, that’s why we love it, and wearing the jersey still speaks so much about where you’re from. And what age you are.”

Paul Howard is an ambassador for Goal. For more see – www.Goalglobal.org/jersey-day