Séamas O'Reilly: Being called Séamus, Shameless or even Semen isn’t the same thing

The truth is no one gets my name wrong more consistently than my own compatriots

Séamas O'Reilly. Picture: Orfhlaith Whelan

This one time my friend, Jay, lost his phone after football. We played five-a-side once a week for five years and so, like any dutiful teammate, I rang his number and quickly found the buzzing device beneath a crumpled, smelly sports bag at the side of the Tottenham astro cage where we’d been playing.

I felt a thrum of amusement when I picked up the handset and saw my name on the screen which he’d saved as “Shameless”, and realised this was what he’d been calling me, to my face, every Wednesday for half a decade.