29 May 2017
Today’s date, 29 May, is one of reflection in memory of the 39 innocent people who lost their lives at Heysel Stadium in Brussels in 1985.
What was supposed to be a festival of football quickly turned into tragedy. Among the dead were 32 Italians, four Belgians, two French and Northern Irishman Patrick Radcliffe, who had been living in Brussels and attended the game as a neutral spectator. Little did he, or anyone else, know of the horror that would soon unfold.
The memory of the victims, taken from their families and loved ones on that ill-fated night, has remained with us constantly for 32 years.
Not a day goes past when we do not feel compelled to remember them and make sure that a similar act of madness must never, ever be repeated.
