Harry Gregg - Life Outside Football

Life Outside Football

Gregg married his first wife, Mavis Markham, at St James's Church, Doncaster, in 1957, while still a Doncaster Rovers players. Their first child, Linda, was born later that year. A second daughter, Karen, was born a year later. Mavis died of cancer in 1961. He later remarried and had four further children; three daughters and a son. He suffered a further tragedy on 24 April 2009 when his daughter Karen died of cancer at the age of 50.

He once owned a hotel (fittingly called The Windsor Hotel) in the town of Portstewart on the North Antrim coast of his native Northern Ireland. He was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in 1995. On 1 July 2008 Gregg was made an Honorary Graduate of the University of Ulster and awarded a Doctor of the University (DUniv) in recognition of his contribution to football at their Summer Graduation Ceremony

In 2009 he was heckled by an intoxicated Traditional Unionist Voice councillor Robin Stirling at a Milk Cup fund raising event in a Chinese restaurant in Ballymena. Stirling was ejected from the premises. Gregg distanced himself from the incident.

Harry Gregg celebrated his time at Old Trafford on 15 May 2012 with a testimonial organised by John White and John Dempsey from the George Best Carryduff Manchester United SC. The testimonial featured Manchester United playing an Irish League Select XI managed by Martin O'Neill and David Jeffrey. The match ended 4-1 to Manchester United.

Gregg, now in his eighties, lives in Coleraine, Northern Ireland.

Read more about this topic:  Harry Gregg

Famous quotes containing the words life and/or football:

    “They say the seeds of what we will do are in all of us, but it always seemed to me that in those who make jokes in life the seeds are covered with better soil and with a higher grade of manure.”
    —Ernest Hemingway (1899–1961)

    “People stress the violence. That’s the smallest part of it. Football is brutal only from a distance. In the middle of it there’s a calm, a tranquility. The players accept pain. There’s a sense of order even at the end of a running play with bodies stewn everywhere. When the systems interlock, there’s a satisfaction to the game that can’t be duplicated. There’s a harmony.”
    —Don Delillo (b. 1926)