Cape Town -
What makes a sports fan? For some, it’s putting on a well-worn jersey and travelling to a stadium for the thrill of a live game. Others spend years crafting teams that compete in fantasy sports leagues.
There are those who thrive on picking apart how today’s teams would fare against the greats of the past - would the Brazilian World Cup-winning team of 2002 have beaten the legendary Seleção which lifted the trophy in 1970?
And then there are the Cape Town fans of English Premier League sides whose devotion to their team is included in the epitaphs on their gravestones.
Under the trees in the peaceful surroundings of Maitland cemetery, there several gravestones bearing emblems of top English Premier League clubs, such as Arsenal and Manchester United.
Kenneth Yorke, of Peninsula Tombstones, said while emblems on gravestones were common, he had not noticed more than a handful had those of football clubs.
Religious motifs and emblems and logos relating to the army, navy, police and air force were also fairly common.
“Literally and figuratively speaking, they are the ‘die-hards’,” said Yorke.
“They lived for what was offered by the (teams or organisations) who own these logos and carried it with pride, hence the family who are left behind feel it is fitting to decorate their tombstones with it.”
Yorke said companies and institutions should take pride in the fact that their logos had been engraved on tombstones.
“It is not used for gain but to honour a fan or service member who was dedicated to supporting that particular organisation.”
Peter Solomon of Fern Funerals said he regularly received requests for logos of sports teams, particularly rugby and soccer teams. Often this was how a family wanted to remember their loved one.
He said it cost an extra R1 500 or more to engrave a sporting logo on a headstone.
Saturday Argus