McAlery’s legacy remembered

Today marks 100 years since the death of John McCredy McAlery.

Not just the founding father of Cliftonville FC but also the man who introduced association football to Ireland, McAlery was a driving force behind the creation of the Irish Football Association, had the honour of being Ireland’s first ever captain and was instrumental in establishing the County Antrim FA and their accompanying Senior Shield which is still played for to this day.

A trailblazer to whom all associated with the Reds will forever be indebted, Saturday past was the 177th anniversary of his birth in Rathfriland.

The son of a farmer, McAlery’s drapery business interests necessitated a move to Belfast, where he opened the Irish Tweed House gentleman’s outfitters on Royal Avenue, while his fondness for cricket also led to the formation of Cliftonville Cricket Club almost a decade before he became captivated by the sport of football while on a trip to Scotland.

Keen to ascertain Irish interest, he invited Scottish sides Caledonian and Queen’s Park to play the first organised game of association football in Ireland in October 1878 and was so enthused by the response that he immediately set in motion the processes that ultimately led to Cliftonville FC, Ireland’s first Football Club, being formed.

He remains a celebrated figure at Solitude, to where he oversaw the Club’s formal move from the adjacent pitches in 1890 and, earlier this year, we were delighted to welcome his great, great grandson Michael and his family from South Africa as our special guests.

Last month, meanwhile, we were proud to mark the Irish FA’s 145th anniversary by acknowledging John’s central role in establishing the fourth-oldest governing body in world football, while supporters were recently quick to snap up limited edition white retro jerseys which fuse past and present in recognition of our founding father’s legacy.

Today, meanwhile, we are delighted to unveil some never-before-seen artifacts of Cliftonville history to the wider public.

Minutes from a committee meeting on May 16, 1887 and arrangements for a trip to England the previous December – all handwritten by McAlery himself – have been uncovered by our Heritage Development Officer, Paul Treanor, who suspects that the former are the oldest surviving minutes from any Football Club in Ireland.

Committee meeting minutes from May 16, 1887

Travel notes from December 1886

Though we have all enjoyed and endured so many thrills and spills in the near century-and-a-half since McAlery’s pioneering vision became a reality in September 1879, it is of course always worth noting that all of your individual Cliftonville related memories – be they Tony Bell’s iconic Irish Cup winning strike against Portadown, Mark Holland’s historic header in Latvia, George McMullan’s ice-cool title-clinching penalty or Ronan Hale’s spine-tingling Windsor Park celebrations in May 2024 – came as a consequence of one man’s ambition and, exactly 100 years to the day since he passed away at his home on the terraces of Belgravia on the Lisburn Road, everyone associated with Ireland’s Oldest Football Club remains grateful for his groundbreaking innovation.