By Cathal Dervan

Those who believe in such things — and there are many in a city like Belfast where religion is a help and a hindrance in equal measures — must believe that George Best went to heaven when they laid his body to rest in the Roselawn Cemetery on Saturday morning.

After all, the signs were ominous for George’s well being in a new world that may be more comforting for him than the one he left behind so tragically after a near lifetime battle with alcoholism and self-doubt.

All morning, as we joined the crowds inside Stormont and those who clapped the cortege all the way from his childhood home to his final resting place in East Belfast, the heavens had opened.

Yet, when George Best finally went to his eternal reward after a fitting tribute from those he left behind, the sun came out as the earth closed on his coffin. It was almost as if the heavens had closed their doors just as George passed through their gates, a gesture befitting Irish football’s very own God.

The Best family, at their own request, was left to grieve privately inside that Roselawn Cemetery at the end of a four hour journey of remembrance, yet those who had stood in the rain awaiting his arrival offered nothing approaching a complaint.

They were just glad, as we were inside the press centre, that they had witnessed the final goodbye, rain or no rain.

The sky, to quote that great old blues song, was crying, but nobody cared as Ireland united in grief and the good, the sad and the bubbly came out in a 50,000 strong crowd to say goodbye to the Belfast boy.

The incessant rain had almost seemed appropriate as dawn broke over Belfast on Saturday and a city so used to grief on both sides of the divide prepared for the one funeral that knew no boundaries.

On Friday night, in the name of research, a colleague and I crossed from one side of the old city to the other just to get a handle on the sadness and the unity of purpose as life prepared one last accolade for the footballer who fuelled all our boyhood dreams.

The Red Devil, a bar dedicated as the name suggests to the football club that is Manchester United, came to a standstill when the two strange faces entered its Falls Road premises in the heart of Nationalist Belfast just before nine o’clock that evening.

Once the accent was identified as clearly southern the barriers came down, the hearts opened as readily as the mouths and all present declared their love for a man from the other side of the tracks.

The location of the United bar — even the staff wear club badges on their working shirts — is as far removed from the Orange Order of the streets Best grew up as you could imagine, yet the man himself often crossed town to sup a pint or two with those who revered his every move.

On Friday they repaid the honour as the Red Devil regulars spoke of their love for Best the footballer, Best the entertainer and Best the genius.

“We’re all Catholics in this bar but there isn’t one of us here tonight that didn’t love George Best,” declared former Europa Hotel employee Joe Gillen.

“George Best had no time for politics or political differences. He believed in football and only in football and that’s why everyone in Northern Ireland loved him, that’s why everyone across the two communities will grieve him.”

Grieve him they did. On the other side of the Lagan, in the Creggagh estate that first played host to those beautiful feet, fans of all creeds, colour and race had placed their own tributes outside the Best family home on the Burren Way.

As darkness doomed to gloom later on Friday night it was hard to believe that behind the front door of that small terraced house lay the lifeless body of the greatest footballer this island has ever produced.

The front garden was awash with flowers, the walls home to scarves and jerseys and tributes from every club in this land and the one across the Irish Sea as football remembered a great one.

By Saturday emotions welled more than one eye as Bestie made his final journey from the Creggagh to the Great Hall at Stormont where so many of his family and friends paid their last respects.

Denis Law, Brian Kennedy, et al gave the man a send off befitting a king, but the greatest quote of the day belonged to the former Northern Ireland striker Derek Dougan, himself a man with no penchant for bigotry despite his East Belfast roots.

Dougan had helped carry the Best coffin into the Great Hall and afterwards he declared, “I played on so many teams that were carried by George Best that it was an honour and a pleasure to carry George for once.”

He was right. It was an honour and a pleasure just to witness the Best goodbye of all on Saturday, but sadly not everyone has learned the lesson of the Belfast Boy’s demise.

On Monday, barely 48 hours after the Belfast soil offered George Best his final stage, Paul Gascoigne fell off the wagon once again as he was sacked as manager by non-league Kettering Town for drinking on the job.

Gazza tried to explain it all away by claiming he had only had a “double brandy” before a game where once upon a time he went through four bottles of whiskey in a day.

Let us all pray that Gazza cops on before he follows in George Best’s footsteps once too often.