‘Now I have a chance to wear an Ireland jersey and play in a World Cup’

The usual combination of age and fatherhood had led Ciaran Tiernan to believe his footballing days were over. However at the age of 36 the Bailieborough man has just made his international bow and is looking forward to gracing the world stage next summer.

The father of two was at home in April when he overheard a news item on the radio, reporting that the Irish Transplant Football Team had finished runners up in their first ever competition.

“I says, I have to get involved with this,” recalls Ciaran. That the team’s inaugural competition had been held in Birmingham resonated with Ciaran.

He was born with a liver condition called biliary atresia. While the condition is extremely rare, during this time Ciaran was one of five Irish children diagnosed. One theory put by medics to Ciaran’s parents for the unusual spike in incidences was the contamination from the Chernobyl meltdown of 1986 - the year his mother was pregnant with him.

“Whatever truth there is to it, no one knows,” says Ciaran now.

He had been one of 10 awaiting a life-saving liver transplant in Ireland.

“I was seventh on the list but the first four weren’t successful,” he recalls, which led his mother Deborah to pursue surgery at Birmingham Children’s Hospital. Ciaran was one of a clutch of children flown over by the Air Corp in April 1992 for the operation - a mission that made the headlines. Even the 10-year anniversary of the operation saw Ciaran and another liver recipient back once again command the front page of a Birmingham paper.

“There were five us travelled over from Ireland and we were all given liver transplants. We were all told that it would be five to ten years before that liver would start to reject and you would need another one.”

Although his condition had set him back in school for a few years, he has survived and thrived since the surgery. Further transplants have so far not been necessary. Aside from taking medication daily, and routine check-ups at St Vincent’s in Dublin he has enjoyed good health. He credits his mother for fighting to get him onto what was then a trial drug, and on which he remains to this day. At one check-up in recent years, Ciaran bumped into one of the other liver recipients.

“He was on is third liver transplant,” reports Ciaran. “Out of the five of us who went, four of us bar me have had two or more transplants.”

Passion

Uppermost in Ciaran’s thoughts as a child was his passion: football.

“When I was put outside in the morning, I’d have football in hand and that was me until I was called back in at night. That never changed because I still love playing football.

“Like everyone else, you think you’re the best footballer in the world and you are thinking to yourself: ‘How has Man United not signed me up yet?’

“The older you get you realise that ship has sailed. But now I have a chance to wear an Ireland jersey and play in a World Cup and have my national anthem playing and people watching. Even when it does come around, I probably still won’t believe it.”

Having moved to Bailieborough in 2000 he immediately immersed himself in the football scene - both soccer and GAA for Celtic and Shamrocks respectively. That Ciaran, who works in Lakeland Dairies, was either training or playing six days a week speaks both to his health and the level of fitness he had attained.

That all came to a shuddering halt for the happiest of reasons for Ciaran and his partner Wendy, the arrival of children - Hunter, who will be two in September and Sonny who is just four and a half months. He also has three children Zoe (11), Zack (8) and Willow (7) from a previous relationship.

Then of course the radio item piqued his interest and he made contact with the Soccer Transplant Team Ireland through their Facebook page.

Full-on

Training sessions in Portlaoise followed and last month he made his debut in a friendly in Belfast against an under-strengthened Northern Ireland. Slotting into midfield, Ciaran provided an assist in the 6-3 win.

“I got a serious wake-up call when I went up to play - these lads all would have played at fairly high levels, and obviously because of their different conditions, they couldn’t continue. So for them and for me to keep it up, it’s great. It’s a lot more full-on than I thought it would be.”

Any notion that players would take it easier on their opponent just because they’ve had, say a double lung transplant is completely off the mark.

“You don’t look at some one and see - Oh he’s a heart transplant, he’s a liver transplant, he’s lung transplant - you look at him and see - he’s trying to take the ball off me. It’s the exact same as a normal game of football.”

Motivation

While the football is the same, many of the players have an added layer of motivation.

“A lot of lads are doing it for their donors, their donors’ families and for their love of football and everything else,” he explains, adding that the other Irish players received their transplants as adults.

“A lot of them are only a couple of years [post-op] and they know that if it wasn’t for them they wouldn’t be pulling on an Ireland jersey and going out to play either.”

Although he was only a child when he had his operation, Ciaran twice sat down to write a letter to pass on to the family of his donor through the hospital, but didn’t follow it through for fear that over three decades later it would reopen “old wounds” for the family. He does see the merit in recipients making contact with donor families however.

“Touch wood, for me so far I’m 32 years and on the same liver, but I’m conscious that there is a strong chance that I will need another. And if that ever did happen, would I contact the donor’s family? I think yes absolutely.”

Despite the win in Belfast, it highlighted the room for improvement if they are to make a dent in the British Transplant Games in Coventry next month and the World Cup in Rome in 2024. Team Ireland will be one of sixteen competing on the world stage next August, and await the draw for the four groups of four.

What’s the hopes for the team?

“If we get out of the group stages, you never know after that.”

That each of the team is healthy enough to participate in sport is worth celebrating and they are going to make the most of the occasion with their loved ones.

“Everyone is bringing as much family and support as they can - regardless of whether we get knocked out during the group stages or go the whole way, everyone’s staying for the duration of the World Cup - it’ll be a big massive group holiday if nothing else.”

Any transplant recipient who is interested in getting involved with Soccer Transplant Team Ireland is encouraged to contact them through Facebook.

Any interest from businesses willing to join Sonas Bathrooms in sponsoring the team would also be welcome.