To Greg Leigh

In the seventy-sixth minute of Ipswich Town’s trip to Barnsley, a loud cheer, roughly equal parts irony, smirk, and appreciation, gradually rippled round the steep kop housing the away fans. Down to my left an Ipswich fan frantically waved the iconic green, gold and black Jamaican flag he’d packed for the occasion. From the home end, spirits already battered by a flurry of goals just before half time, a few half-hearted boos broke out. On bounced Greg Leigh to see out the final 15 minutes, as Ipswich cruised to a 3-0 win in one of the division’s toughest games.

Greg Leigh, cult hero. Tenacious full backs often make good cult hero material. For Ipswich there’s a good long line of them running from George Burley through Maurico Taricco to Fabian Wilnis and many more besides. Unlike Greg Leigh, none of them (to my knowledge) could knock out a faultless rendition of Bill Withers’ Just the two of us on the piano. It seems unfair then that the cult of Greg got founded on a game that he didn’t play. His mysterious Jamaica international call-up, non-call-up, got our March away game at Barnsley cancelled, so we could re-play it as a glorious Late April culmination to our Spring-time bulldozer to promotion. The best day and night we’d all had at the football in two decades, courtesy of some funky paperwork and crossed wires.     

As a player, Leigh deserves more than being remembered for not playing. He was a serious upgrade on pretty much any Left Back we’d had at the club in the previous five years. Indefatigable, strong and committed in the tackle, purposeful and diligent with the ball, with a driving run and shapely cross that we barely got to see. The quality of Leif Davis meant we barely got to see anything much of Greg really, 826 minutes across league and cup, but what we saw, we appreciated. Most of all, we loved the leap, that prodigious spring that saw him crash through and above taller opponents, dreadlocks flying. As he leaves for some well-deserved first team football, he will get a tremendous amount of love and no little sadness at his departure.

There are some, inevitably, who are above this sort of sentimentality. The club needs to be ruthless, always be improving, the lad simply isn’t good enough for the places that we want to go. But whilst the club might need to be so dispassionate, we certainly don’t. What a joy it is for players to be leaving Ipswich Town with heads held high and all our best wishes! For so much of the last 15 years it has almost felt like contempt was the default relationship between fans and players. Those that pulled on the shirt seemed to get begrudging support for their efforts. The underlying assumption was that most players came to the club to defraud us, to minimise their talents and efforts, to hide rather than shine. In those days when someone left the club, the majority got a solid “good riddance”, the lucky minority a “sad he never quite lived up to his potential”.

An outburst of appreciation for a discarded squad player? Almost unheard of. But this love for Leigh? This feels like it’s supposed to feel between players and fans. An appreciation of a player’s qualities, not infinite qualities, but there, nonetheless. A nostalgia about the moments we shared, a twinge of regret at the parting, at the ruthlessness of the disposal. This game is supposed to be about joy and heroes, about supporters, as a mass, exalting their avatars on the pitch. It feels so good to be back here, with the feeling that everyone at the club is someone to be proud of, that the fans’ job is to voice their belief in the players, rather than their disappointment.

Long live the cult of Greg Leigh.