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Gareth Fullerton

Gerry Flynn had Irish League players 'running scared' with lockdown stories

Gerry Flynn says he had some well-known former Irish League players 'running scared' with his lockdown stories.

Flynn became a social media hit back in 2020 when he posted daily videos on Twitter about his days as a player and coach.

The comical anecdotes centred around popular names including Lee Feeney, Marty Quinn and Mark Picking, with Flynn spilling the beans on some hilarious moments that would be unheard of today.

Read more: Gerry Flynn tells hilarious story about Marty Quinn and a flying Jaffa Cake

Former Cliftonville title winner Flynn recorded the videos from his home in Murcia in Spain, which had been transformed into a virtual ghost town because of the coronavirus crisis two years ago.

Flynn recalled his lockdown stories this week on Belfast Live's That's What I Call Football podcast, and admits some of his video subjects were terrified of what he would say about them.

He said: "We were in a proper lockdown in Spain. We weren't allowed out of the garden for 13 weeks.

"After the second week I was texting people, reading, exercising in the garden. People were doing toilet roll challenges and all that.

"It started off as a bit of banter, and then I was getting text messages from boys the night before asking what I was going to say and saying 'don't say anything about me'.

"Some of the boys liked them, some of them didn't. But it got me through lockdown and I had a bit of a laugh and it kept me connected with a lot of boys.

"Some boys got a good laugh out of it, and it gave me a taste to get back in the Irish League again."

While the videos were restricted to just 2m 20secs because of Twitter's rules, Flynn says it sometimes took hours to record a single episode.

"Believe it or not, it was really hard to do. And it took up the day. I was thinking of what I could say and couldn't say," he said.

"Some of them took 20-30 takes. You would stutter or you would swear in some of them, which I didn't want to do.

"The Lee Feeney story was the hardest one. See trying to tell a clean story about Feeno, it is impossible.

"And it actually turned out boring. People thought the one about Feeno would be massive, 'tell this one and that one', but you can't. He has kids now and all that and you have to be very careful.

"And wee Picky (Mark Picking) was another one. He texted me the night before asking what I was going to say.

"I never thought it would get the traction it did. We connected with a lot of people and we made a podcast out of it with Simba (Colm Girvan)."

He added: "Some of the stories from years ago couldn't even be repeated now. There would be people locked up for some of the things and people wouldn't be in the jobs they are now.

"There were some great characters, like Mickey Collins - you could write an encyclopedia about some of the things he did."

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