Sinn Féin's cricket test: get unionists on side with an all-island success story
Sam McBride, Sunday Independent and Sunday Life, August 10th, 2025
A few weeks ago, I sat with my young son high in the Compton Stand at Lord's cricket ground watching a compelling spectacle. At the spiritual home of this quintessentially English game, India were battling towards an improbable win. Around us, the Indian fans were exuberant, until a freak wicket brought England a 22-run victory.
A British Indian man was supporting England, while many more were supporting India. But contrary to the dark fears behind Norman Tebbit's infamous "cricket test” about judging Asian migrants by who they supported when England played their homeland, the banter was good-humoured. Both sets of fans appreciated the skill and determination of two almost perfectly matched teams.
This was a scene far from Dublin or Belfast, yet one which is getting closer. Over the past two decades, Ireland's cricketers have risen from no-hopers to become a recognisable force in world cricket. Players such as Kevin O'Brien, Eoin Morgan (who would go on to captain England after moving there) and Paul Stirling are recognisable to millions of cricket fans thousands of miles from home — where most of them could walk down the street here unnoticed.
Ireland's cricketers have beaten England, Pakistan and the West Indies, turning professional along the way and being admitted to the exclusive club of 12 Test-playing nations allowed to play the most challenging five-day version of the game. A year ago, Ireland beat Zimbabwe at Stormont, the first Test match victory at home.
Two major infrastructure decisions on either side of the Border will influence the future of this game in Ireland for the rest of this century.
In Dublin, plans have been submitted for a new ground at Abbottstown. Last month, Cricket Ireland, the governing body, agreed to put £1m (€1.15m) towards a major redevelopment of the Stormont ground, where cricket is played within sight of Parliament Buildings.
Rugby precedent
The infrastructure behind sport isn't as glamorous as the game, but is uniquely significant for an all-island sport. In rugby, Ireland once played matches in both Belfast and Dublin, but as northern infrastructure lagged further and further behind, the sport's biggest fixtures are now held in Dublin exclusively.
The same thing could happen in cricket. Abbottstown should have a capacity of up to 20,000 (only 4,200 seats will be permanent), which could see every big match played there for financial reasons.
Planning approval for Stormont's redevelopment was granted last year. Now it's just waiting for cash — £25m in all (much of it not linked to cricket) — and cash is tight at Stormont.
Finding money for this project could help resolve a key conundrum in northern politics. Sinn Féin is demanding Casement Park GAA ground in west Belfast be rebuilt as a massive state-of-the-art stadium, but the GAA is only prepared to contribute a small portion of the funding.
Despite extra money from the British and Irish governments, it is still well short. The DUP is under pressure from its voters, in part due to residual hostility to the GAA and partly because the GAA largely created this problem by annoying local residents, which delayed construction as inflation exploded.
First Minister Michelle O'Neill has stated firmly that Casement will be built on her watch, yet the DUP can veto that unless there is a compromise. A solution could see more money for football grounds and for the Stormont cricket ground, alongside more money for Casement.
If Sinn Féin is smart, it will see this as a win-win because Ireland playing more games in Belfast is in the party's strategic interests. Sport has a unique ability to foster mutual understanding and national pride.
It's not that supporting Ireland in any sport will turn unionists into nationalists. Plenty of unionists are still thoroughly pro-union while cheering on Ireland in the Aviva. But having these people cheering an all-island team is surely better for Sinn Féin in fostering a communal sense of Irishness than the alternative.
This is about far more than building community or making people more active. When government backs sport — as it is with helping fund the €35m Abbotstown project — it's often hard-nosed. This isn't just about the projected €93m in tourism the stadium might bring in by 2030. The well-informed Irish cricket journalist Nathan Johns recently reported that "those involved in these decisions talk of Abbotstown being a part of the Irish Government's strategy of opening economic links to Asia — India in particular”.
India is booming economically, and Ireland isn't alone in seeking to connect with this growing global power. Cricket is the sport that dominates Indian culture. The 2030 T20 World Cup is being co-hosted by England, Wales, Ireland and Scotland, presenting a chance to demonstrate Ireland to a global audience.
The day after the Lord's Test match, India's cricketers met King Charles — a subtle act of diplomacy that will have been accompanied by far more significant private attempts to maximise the presence of thousands of Indians — many of them wealthy — who had travelled to England.
Spin
Over recent years, migrants from India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka have reinvigorated many Irish cricket clubs, which in turn has helped integrate new arrivals.
In a Northern Ireland context, sport can break down barriers even if it can also reinforce barriers. A few months ago, I watched two Indian teams playing cricket in Londonderry Park on the outskirts of Newtownards, a strongly unionist town, while a couple of boys knocked a sliotar about beyond the boundary.
The Ards Peninsula has long been a hotbed of hurling, and here were these two games which once were a marker of difference being played side by side.
In truth, they have key similarities — a hard ball being hit with an implement fashioned from either ash or willow according to a set of rules which to the uninitiated appear unintelligible.
Cricket is not just a complex game in that sense. It also has a complex history on this island, arriving with the English and being seen as the epitome of Britishness — yet the sport captivated IRA commander Martin McGuinness, hunger striker Pat Sheehan and SDLP leader John Hume, who bowled a slow left arm spin for City of Derry and Waterside cricket clubs.
Unlikely as it may seem, cricket is the perfect game to convey the rich diversity of what Ireland has become.
UVF killer cites double jeopardy in Cairns case
John Toner, Sunday Life, August, 10th, 2025
A UVF killer being prosecuted over the murder of two brothers is trying to have the case thrown out citing double jeopardy.
Laurence Maguire (62) is charged with conspiring to murder Gerard and Rory Cairns who were shot dead at their family home near Bleary, Co Down, in 1993.
It follows an interview that Maguire — who was jailed in 1994 for five murders — gave to a 2019 BBC Spotlight programme about the activities of the terrorist group in mid Ulster.
He was due to appear before Belfast Magistrates Court last month for a preliminary hearing, but did not attend.
The court was told it is the defence's case that these matters “have already been prosecuted”, while it was further revealed the Public Prosecution Service have “asked the police to review further material”.
District Judge Steven Keown adjourned the case until September to allow for further disclosure between the parties.
Gerard Cairns (22) and his 18-year-old brother Rory were shot dead by the UVF in October 1993.
Former UVF commanders Billy 'King Rat' Wright and Robin 'The Jackal' Jackson were reportedly arrested following the killings and released without charge.
Maguire was in jail at the time the two brothers were killed.
However, it was claimed in the documentary that there had been an earlier plan to target all male members of the Cairns family in 1992.
Maguire was subsequently questioned about the allegations before a decision was taken to charge him in connection with the aborted attack.
He is accused of conspiring with others to murder Gerard Cairns, Rory Cairns, Liam Cairns, Eamon Cairns and persons unknown on dates between September 1991 and October 1993.
Maguire also faces further counts of possessing firearms, namely a magnum and .38 handgun, in suspicious circumstances, with intent to endanger life and without a licence.
Time for a DUP apology over Trimble jibes after SF talks were exposed
Suzanne Breen, Sunday Life, August 10th, 2025
The DUP owes the mother of all apologies to the Ulster Unionists.
For years its supporters made the lives of David Trimble and his colleagues hell for the compromises they made.
Northern Ireland's biggest unionist party has always maintained it never sat down with Sinn Fein until Ian Paisley met Gerry Adams at Stormont in March 2007, just before the two parties entered power-sharing.
In last weekend's Belfast Telegraph, my colleague Sam McBride reported on newly declassified Downing Street files which laid bare how the DUP misled its voters and the media.
They show how close the DUP was to entering government with Sinn Fein in late 2004, just weeks before the Northern Bank robbery and the IRA murder of Robert McCartney.
Former Methodist president, the Rev Harold Good, last year revealed that he'd hosted secret negotiations between the DUP and Sinn Fein in his home that year.
He said the talks were attended by Martin McGuinness and Sir Jeffrey Donaldson.
They expanded to include East Antrim MP Sammy Wilson, and the Rev Paisley was kept informed by telephone.
Refusing to talk to Sinn Fein was a key DUP policy. In 2003, the Rev Paisley said any party member who did so would be expelled.
Peter Robinson was also firm on the matter that year.
“We are open and above board, people know exactly what we are doing and we will not be telling people we are doing one thing in public and doing something else in private,” he added.
In January 2004, Gregory Campbell said of Sinn Fein: “We will not be holding face-to-face discussions until the IRA has gone… we will not have discussions with them either by the front door or back door.”
False impressions
Donaldson that month argued in favour of the motion 'This House would not talk to Sinn Fein' at an Oxford Union debate.
Yet the former Lagan Valley MP had no problem doing precisely that behind closed doors.
The impression carefully crafted for public consumption was that the DUP wouldn't be alone in a room with Sinn Fein even if armed with garlic and a crucifix.
The talks in Rev Good's house weren't even a one-off event.
“I have lost count of the number of times they met,” Rev Good said of the Donaldson-McGuinness assignations.
And all the while the DUP continued to contemptuously refer to “Sinn Fein/IRA” in public.
But what really takes this to a breathtaking level of hypocrisy is the venom it had previously unleashed on Trimble.
When the UUP spoke to Sinn Fein, it had the guts to do so publicly in a talks process.
It was denounced by its unionist rival for doing so.
The vitriol and venom directed towards Trimble was unrelenting.
I covered a meeting of the Ulster Unionist Council at the Waterfront Hall in May 2000. DUP supporters gathered outside sang:
What shall we do with the traitor Trimble
What shall we do with the traitor Trimble
What shall we do with the traitor Trimble
Early in the morning?
Burn, burn, burn the traitor
Burn, burn, burn the traitor
Burn, burn, burn the traitor
Early in the morning
In subsequent verses, they gleefully switched his mode of death from burning to hanging and shooting.
Gavin Robinson personally bears no responsibility for any of this.
He was 15 when Trimble was being vilified. He was a student when the talks were underway at Rev Good's gaff.
Leadership
But it would be an act of leadership for him to say sorry to the UUP on behalf of his party corporately.
The DUP's response this week to its secret shenanigans with Sinn Fein was . Some individual members “did accept invites to confidential meetings” to see if they could reach a deal, but “the party did not authorise any meetings before March 2007”.
That's about as believable as the leadership's now comical claim from last year that the Irish Sea border doesn't exist.
old boys plan for PROVOS
David O’Dornan, Sunday Life, August 10th, 2025
STATE PAPERS REVEAL HAGGLING TO ENTICE IRA TO GIVE UP ITS ARMS UUP LEADER DAVID TRIMBLE ALSO SUGGESTED LEGALISING GROUP TO BREAK POLITICAL DEADLOCK
A top British diplomat argued the British and Irish governments in conjunction with the US should be urging the “IRA to (transform) themselves into a retired servicemen's league”, newly released state papers have revealed.
Sir Ivor Roberts believed the move could form part of the process to progress Provo decommissioning and get the republican terrorists to formally end their armed campaign as part of peacebuilding in Northern Ireland.
In a file marked 'personal and confidential' but declassified by the National Archives last week, the then ambassador to Ireland detailed his views in a memo dated February 4, 2002, sent to Sir Bill Jeffrey, political director of the NIO, with Downing Street chief of staff Jonathan Powell copied in.
He said: “I mentioned when we spoke last week that I had been giving increasing thought to the problems we are likely to face over the next month if there is no sign of any further movement by the IRA on decommissioning.
“I think you know that I personally (not of course alone in this) am sceptical about the whole decommissioning exercise and wish we had never got into the game.
“As Sinn Féin have reminded Fianna Fail, the latter never decommissioned, they merely buried their arms and stood down their army.
“I actually believe that it would be more productive if we had been on that tack and if we, the Irish government and the US had been at one in getting the IRA to (transform) themselves into a retired servicemen's league.
9/11 changed political climate
“There are good reasons why the IRA might themselves conclude that the timing was now right for this.
“Firstly, the international climate for terrorism has so radically changed in the last four months (post 9/11); the terms of trade have moved irreversibly against them and any further evidence of activities (like Colombia) would bring even greater penalties down on their heads from the Republican administration in Washington and even from their erstwhile supporters on the Hill.
“Secondly, standing down their army would allow them to play a more active role in government building and coalition membership here in the Republic. At the moment they are self-excluding themselves from power as the Irish Constitution bans any other army but the one raised by the Oireachtas.
“I imagine that if anyone were so minded, they could in fact launch a constitutional case on the validity of the election of Sinn Féin members of the Dail while the IRA remained in existence and while Sinn Fein links to it were so robust.
“There have, however, been no recent indications of the IRA considering a move to what Adams once described as 'an honourable retirement' and no doubt there are several Republican constitutional hoops to go through before that happy day is reached.
“In the meantime, we have to manage another threat to the stability of the institutions if there is no further act of decommissioning in the next month or so.”
Elsewhere in a separate file, as negotiations dragged on a year-and-a-half later on the issue, then Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble also floated the idea of an IRA name change to the 'Irish Republican Brotherhood'.
Mr Trimble had suggested making the IRA legal in a bid to break the deadlock in negotiations with Sinn Fein, an idea which Downing Street chief of staff Jonathan Powell called “imaginative”.
Talks had been going on for months in attempting to strike a deal, with the British and Irish governments offering the republicans “a package of IRA words, an act of decommissioning and calling elections in the autumn”.
In the newly released National Archives files, in his July 23, 2003, letter to prime minster Tony Blair, marked 'confidential — personal', Powell said: “Trimble has absolutely refused the sequencing we were discussing. He says the IRA statement and act of decommissioning must come before an election is called.
Useful Idiots
“Trimble did not object to the elements of the deal. And he came up with the imaginative suggestion that the IRA should become legal and transparent.
“He put this to Adams and McGuinness earlier in the day.
“He was not asking them to disband but in the context of devolution of criminal justice, the government should de-proscribe the IRA.
“The leadership of the IRA should become public. We needed to demonstrate that the past was the past and it was never going to happen again.
“Trimble said he had asked colleagues to work up language that could be put to Sinn Fein.
“There are some obvious problems with this — we would be accused of being useful idiots if we legalised the IRA when it had not fundamentally changed.
“And we would need to do the same with the loyalists. Only RIRA, CIRA and LVF would remain proscribed.”
Two months later, Powell sent another missive to Blair in which he said the Ulster Unionist leader's suggestion to make the Provos legal had been dismissed by Sinn Fein's Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness who “are not taking this proposal seriously”.
Provos urged to come clean over forgotten victim of Miami Showband massacre
Ivan Little, Sunday Life, August 10th, 2025
IRA men have been urged to come clean about how they tried to tarnish the name of the 'forgotten' victim of the Miami Showband massacre 50 years ago.
Republicans claimed Norman 'Mooch' Kerr was involved with loyalist terrorist groups and undercover officers with the Army.
But his friends said the allegations were false and were made to cover up that the 28-year-old DJ was murdered in a sectarian revenge attack for the showband atrocity.
Last week, UVF and UDA paramilitaries in Portadown insisted Mr Kerr had never been a member of either terrorist group.
The owner of the One Step Beyond disco was shot dead two weeks after the Miami Showband attack as he packed away his DJ equipment following a show in the Camrick bar in Armagh.
It appears his friendship with one of the UVF gang who attacked the band may have been enough to seal his fate.
Mr Kerr knew Harris Boyle, one of two UVF men blown to pieces by the bomb they were planting on the group's tour bus in July 1975.
The surviving terrorists shot three of the band dead after the blast.
Following Mr Kerr's murder, Boyle's mother Evelyn told newspapers she believed he was “picked out because he was a friend of my son”.
She also said Boyle had warned him against running discos in Armagh.
A man who was friendly with Mr Kerr, but who did not wish to be identified, said: “There was talk of Mooch being involved with the likes of Robert Nairac and that he used his mobile disco to gather intelligence on terrorists, but I don't believe it.
“I think Mooch was killed in revenge for the Miami massacre. It was a sectarian murder, pure and simple.
“Even 50 years on, the people who killed him should come clean.”
Mr Kerr's grocer father Alex said his son was shot by a “madman” who targeted him because he was a Protestant connected with showbusiness.
Commemoration
In a BBC interview at the time, Mr Kerr's girlfriend said she had been sitting beside her partner in a bar after closing time when a gunman came in and shot him in the head.
She added her boyfriend had not condoned terrorist attacks and had lived for music.
Earlier this year, a book about the Miami Showband massacre and other loyalist atrocities claimed the IRA targeted Mr Kerr because they found incriminating details about him and Robert Nairac.
It was claimed they obtained this information after stealing a diary belonging to Boyle while he was in a swimming pool in Portadown.
Last week, hundreds of people attended a band parade in memory of Boyle in the town, days the after survivors of the Miami massacre had gathered for a 50th anniversary commemoration service at the scene of the atrocity at Buskhill. outside Newry.
Martin McGartland: I prevented Provos pulling off Army massacre on par with Narrow Water'
David Dornan, Sunday Life, August 10th, 2025
SPY TELLS PODCAST OF IRA PLOT TO BOMB CONVOY
Martin McGartland has claimed that if he had not prevented an IRA bomb attack on an Army convoy coming off the Larne ferry, it would have been a massacre on the scale of the Narrow Water atrocity.
The Belfast man is one of the most high-profile agents in the history of the Troubles. A 2008 movie was made of his memoir Fifty Dead Men Walking, starring Jim Sturgess as McGartland and Ben Kingsley as his handler.
In a new in-depth interview, he revealed more details about alerting the authorities to planned Provo murder bids before his cover was blown as a spy in 1991, and cited the planned 'spectacular' attack on soldiers as “one of the biggest jobs I ever stopped”.
He said: “The IRA used to have a lot of people in intelligence. They had a guy inserted onto the Larne to Stranraer ferry. What happened was, he was gathering intelligence. There were two jobs because of that, because of him working on that ship, that he was able to plan.”
McGartland said the first attack he foiled was tipping off Special Branch that the IRA intended to load a “large Semtex bomb onto a minibus” that would be driven into the harbour terminal and blown up while it was unattended.
But the second plot was on a much larger scale.
1,000 lb Caravan Bomb
Speaking on The Troubles Podcast with host Oisin Feeney, McGartland said: “This was a huge, probably the biggest job that I ever stopped, and it would have been a massacre.
“This guy on the ferry had seen that the UDR were travelling on the Larne ferry with a convoy of about a dozen Army trucks.
“Most of the trucks had all different types of stuff in them — weapons, maybe sort of ammunition or whatever — but the last two or three had soldiers.
“What happened was, they travelled from Larne, out on the main bypass. I think they drove for about a mile or two, and then they forked off, I think up towards Antrim.
“There was a lay-by on the left-hand side, about a couple of hundred yards, before the actual trucks had to turn off the road.
“The IRA had planned to put a caravan there that they were going to convert, and they wanted to put a thousand pound of explosives in the back of the caravan.
“They were going to strengthen the whole caravan and lay all the explosives, about a ton-and-a-half, on the floor.
“Whenever the actual convoys went by, they were going to have a command wire running along the field, down to the left-hand side, with a vantage point.
“The person who was in charge of the wire would be able to see when the second last truck was going by and detonate it.
Mayhem averted
“I mean, honestly, if you saw this road, it's a single carriageway one way, and single carriageway the other way. It would have been an absolute massacre, it would have been mayhem.
“I went and told Special Branch, and then we had to find a way to stop this.
“What they done, they just stopped the trucks travelling over from Scotland.
“The reason they did that was because when some things were too big, they had to be nipped in the bud very, very quickly.
“That bombing, for them Army trucks, would have been on the scale of Narrow Water.”
In August 1979, the Provisional IRA ambushed a similar convoy with two large roadside bombs at Narrow Water Castle outside Warrenpoint, killing 18 soldiers in the single deadliest attack on the Army of the Troubles.
After being exposed as an agent in 1991, McGartland jumped out a window to escape IRA men ready to torture and kill him.
His past would catch up with him when he was shot six times during an assassination attempt in England in 1999.
British soldier turned Australian senator told colleague not to attempt CPR on IRA hitman's father in 1977
John Toner, Sunday Life, August 10th, 2025
MEMOIR CLAIMS AUSSIE SENATOR ADVISED AGAINST CPR DURING 1977 RAID IN BELFAST
A former officer in the Parachute Regiment turned Australian politician was present during the death of the father of notorious IRA hitman Gerard 'Hucker' Moyna during the Troubles, a new book has claimed.
Warwick Stacey was recently elected to the senate of New South Wales as member of the far-right One Nation party.
It subsequently emerged the now 72-year-old had warned a fellow Para “not to resuscitate” Frank Moyna as he lay dying from a heart attack during a British Army search of the family home in 1977.
The death sparked outrage amid claims the soldiers had blocked medical assistance. There is no suggestion that Mr Moyna died as a result of Mr Stacey's actions.
Gerard Moyna later referring to it as a formative memory.
The incident was captured in a memoir by ex-squaddie David Ellis called A Winter In Belfast, as reported by Australian news outlet Crikey.
The book is a transcript of Mr Ellis' diary entries from the time, supplemented with comments from other members of the company.
The memoir includes two diary entries surrounding the events of January 25, 1977, detailing how a British Army unit searched three houses as a “follow-up action” to a bombing.
Doctor called
During the search, Mr Ellis writes, the house owner Frank Moyna had a heart attack and “keeled over and expired”.
He claims a doctor and priest were called and the soldiers left once the priest had arrived.
Mr Ellis includes a comment from Mr Stacey about his role in the events.
The senator said he told fellow soldier Michael 'Embo' Emberson, not to perform CPR on Mr Moyna due to concerns about how it might look to people after the fact.
The book reads: “I remember telling Embo not to pump his chest, as I had been told that to do a good job on that you had to hear ribs crack.
“I didn't think that would be a good look at any subsequent inquest.”
The soldiers were accused of “murder by refusing access to medical teams” by republicans at the time. The book said there were threats of violence made against the troops as a result.
Gerry Fitt, at that point the MP for West Belfast, asked questions about the matter in Parliament.
Frank Moyna is remembered in the Clonard Martyrs Memorial Garden in west Belfast.
A plaque in the garden says that it is dedicated to “civilians murdered by loyalist and British forces during the course of the conflict”.
His son Gerard is thought to have been responsible for up to two dozen murders during the Troubles, including those of Shankill Butchers leader Lenny Murphy and Ulster Unionist politician Edgar Graham.
Despite spending two lengthy terms in prison, he was never charged with murder.
