City says farewell to legend Hurricane Higgins

Fellow snooker player and friend Jimmy White led the tributes to "Hurricane" Higgins but was overcome by emotion and needed help reading out his statement.

St Anne's Church of Ireland Cathedral was packed with 400 former players, friends and family, with thousands more outside paying their last respects.

Past and present stars of the game including Stephen Hendry, Ken Doherty, Willie Thorne, Shaun Murphy and John Virgo attended.

Higgins, 61, twice world champion, died last month after a long battle with throat cancer and alcohol.

The statement from White said: "He was mind-blowing, he did things I'd never seen before.

"He was The Hurricane. I will miss him to the end."

Higgins's daughter Lauren added: "A million times I will cry; if love alone could have saved you, you never would have died."

His sisters Anne and Jean sat at the front of the cathedral

along with Lauren and son Jordan.

Ryan Thomas from Coronation Street, Northern Ireland ministers Nelson McCausland and Arlene Foster, Lord Mayor of Belfast Pat Convery and the Olympic pentathlon champion Dame Mary Peters were at the service.

A tearful White helped carry the coffin of the troubled star who was found dead in a flat in Belfast last month.

A floral tribute outside the church read: "The People's Champion."

Following a funeral in the family home, a cortege led by a horse drawn carriage wound its way through the centre of Belfast.

Hundreds gathered in the Sandy Row area, where Higgins grew up and died.

White added: "Only a year ago Alex was talking about playing again and coming on the road with me.

"It angers me that he never listened to anyone, close friends or family but that was Alex he was an individual, his own man, he was The Hurricane."

White recounted an anecdote from a casino in Southampton where they had been drinking and gambling for days. They were in the toilet chatting and White sat on the sink – which came off the wall flooding the place. Higgins confessed to the damage and the pair spent the day in police cells until it was paid for.

For his daughter Lauren there was just shock, hurt and anger.

"In life I loved you dearly, in death I love you still. In my heart you hold a place that no-one could ever fill," she said.

Dean of Belfast Houston McKelvey was assisted during the service by Bishop of Down and Dromore Harold Miller.

Mr McKelvey delivered the eulogy. "Alex at a very young age encountered two of the greatest temptations possible - fame and fortune. He found it difficult to cope with both. He was not the first to find this difficult and he certainly will not be the last," he said.

He warned against judgmental comments on the life of the at times irascible champion who famously had an explosive temper and whose drinking often attracted negative headlines.

"Since Alex's death many have been judgmental despite the fact that there are few Irish families that I know of who don't have their own 'character' to cope with in the family system."

Taking up the sport at the age of 11, Higgins won the All-Ireland and Northern Ireland amateur championships in 1968.

After turning professional he became the youngest World Championship winner at his first attempt in 1972.

However he was banned from five tournaments and fined 12,000 in 1986 when he butted a tournament director. In 1990 Higgins was banned again after he punched a tournament director at the World Championship.

He went through two divorces and suffered years of ill-health linked to heavy smoking. He earned 4m but was living in sheltered housing at the end.