Pat Jennings: "I never dreamt I'd be back in Newry unveiling a statue"

Pat Jennings spoke to the crowd after a statue was unveiled in his honour in Newry.

Transcript

00:00 applause to Pat Jennings. Pat, come forward please, come forward. How special a day is

00:10 this for you? I can't believe it's happening this evening. I've watched other people get

00:16 statues available and never thought it would ever happen to me. I can say that I've had

00:22 an unbelievable career in football from leaving here as a 17 year old to join Watford and

00:28 never dreamt I'd be back 60 years later, over 60 years, and unveiling a statue. And I'm

00:34 made a lovely place here. I have every opportunity I'm back home. Lovely to see the family and

00:40 friends here over the years. It would have been easy to put this statue at Windsor Park,

00:46 but why was it important for you to have it here in your home city? This is basically

00:50 my home, my home city, where I wouldn't have wanted it anywhere else. I was lucky enough

00:55 to have where football started for me and out of the middle. I had that named Jennings

01:01 Park in 1976 and I've really been proud of that. Everywhere I go, I've never missed the

01:07 opportunity to acknowledge that and thank people, thank the Newly Council for putting

01:12 that up. And I know you have a lot of people you would like to say a quick thank you to

01:16 today, because obviously there's been a long list of people who have helped make this possible

01:22 today. It was important to Pat to publicly thank all of you today. And I don't want to

01:27 leave anybody out, that's why I'm reading it. So I'd like to thank the committee members,

01:32 Adrian Toner, Laurie Powell, Kevin McAllister, Wayne Dennett, Doug Nash, Gary Locks, and

01:39 Eamon Markey. And a further thanks go to Ted Carson, Lindsay Graydon, Pat O'Hagan, Pat

01:45 Savage, Vicky Keenan, Michael Savage, Gerry Armstrong, and yourself Steve for a fantastic

01:52 job. Yeah, incredible talents. Also, Mandy Edwards, who has done a fantastic job here

01:59 we'll see in a minute. Chris Butler and all the whole team at Castlepoint Arts Foundry

02:04 in North Wales. And finally a big thanks to everyone who's contributed in any way to making

02:10 this possible. All the finances that were involved and all the people that put functions

02:15 on, the golf clubs, all that sort of stuff. Everybody had spent a pound, thousands of

02:20 pounds. Thankfully I'll never forget what's happened today. It's worth absolutely every

02:27 penny and all the effort that was put in. And I just wanted to say on behalf of us all,

02:32 we're delighted that you're here today and you're looking good as well. So thank you

02:37 Pat.