'I'm not Ryan Reynolds, but I'm Sheffield proud': Reverend and the Makers frontman Jon McClure on why he's taken over world's oldest football club

While the reality might be a word or two too long to fit the beat of the song that launched the Reverend and the Makers into the pop mainstream, their rock star front man admits it is a “colossal responsibility” after this week being unveiled as lead vocals at Sheffield FC.

The proud son of the Steel City has taken it upon himself, along with a group of local businessmen and a pop music executive, to help take the origin story of the birthplace of football to a wider global audience while simultaneously trumpeting the heritage and culture of the home he so dearly loves.

McClure has taken a minority shareholding in the club but as the most recognisable name, has been installed as chairman.

There are plans but no sweeping prophecies. They want to take Sheffield FC back into the city, away from the tired-looking Coach and Horses ground round the back of a pub car park, with the planning application for the old Transport Sports Club site at Meadowhead that has been sat at Sheffield City Council for two years and faces residents’ objections, remaining active.

McClure’s group is exploring options to launch a documentary on the club’s unique slice of football history, and among the possibilities they’re exploring for the future is the hosting of a football festival, attaching the club’s name to the growing, lucrative field of E-Sports, and giving equal backing to the women’s team.

In the present, McClure – with a gold tooth, hair flapping in the wind and a smart sandy suit – is willing to get his hands dirty.

“I was in here Sunday night taking a table to bits and hoovering,” says McClure ahead of Monday’s unveiling press conference in the club’s boardroom.

“We’re prepared to do the work and the hard miles to get this up and running.

“And let’s be right, we’re sat in two portakabins stood on top of each other, there’s a long way to go.”

Sheffield FC have been in existence, famously, since 1857, longer than any club in the world.

Yet the men’s team find themselves in the ninth tier with their history littered with examples of people trying to breathe new life into a club of historical significance.

So why has McClure – who still plays festivals, manages musicians and comedians – got involved?

“Firstly it’s very exciting, the sentence I’m the chairman of the world’s oldest football club is such a colossal responsibility that I take very seriously,” McClure tells The Yorkshire Post.

“With Sheffield FC there’s a civic responsibility to get it right and I think whilst I am excited I’m also tempered with the realisation that it’s hard, non-league is difficult.

“That’s why I assembled a team of people that can help me do it because I was conscious of the fact that ‘rock star comes in and does football club’ can be perceived as a car crash waiting to happen.

“I’ve got to an age in my 40s where I’ve done a bit, but I’ve still got a bit of energy, so this is me and my pals’ time to put a bit back.

“Right about now, me and my gang are probably the best placed people to hold this club and take it forward, and it’s a responsibility we take seriously.

“We’ve got to be very realistic about what we’re promising, we’re saying these are our aims and ambitions, tempered with the fact there is a ceiling, especially for the men’s team.

“But there’s an element that you can’t go very wrong. This club has struggled almost from its inception so any sort of growth or improvement is progress.”

McClure was keen to stress this was not another Wrexham, though the North Wales club that went from obscurity to global interest is clearly a blueprint.

“I’m not Ryan Reynolds, I’m not anywhere near that famous, right?” says McClure.

“The Wrexham thing is not how it’s really going to work. I think it’s a slightly different model. And also Wrexham is not the first club in the world. This club, in some ways, is the superstar.”

The women’s team could be a way to take the Sheffield FC brand into a new era.

In a city dominated by Wednesday and United, with the Steelers, Sharks, Eagles and Tigers commanding their own loyal support base, there is a gap in the market for a women’s football team and sitting in the fourth tier, that could be the quickest way to grow the name.

“I think there’s a real opportunity on the women’s side to do something transformational, but that starts with community building,” says McClure.

“We very deliberately appointed a female head of social media because if you’re going to build a community around women, no one better to do it than a woman.

“We have a duty to our daughters and nieces to ask how can we inspire them?”

The history of the club enchants him, he sees it as untapped potential. In the press conference he holds up the FIFA order of merit that Sheffield FC, along with Real Madrid, are the only recipients of. In the upper Portakabin a little later on he references Nathaniel Creswick and William Prest, founders of the club and authors of the first rules of football.

“I did a really big gig in the summer, biggest I’ve ever headlined,” he begins. “The night before I went to my dad’s grave and just sat with him, even though I’m not a religious man.

“I’ve got it in my head I need to go and see William and Nathaniel’s graves and say ‘nice one’. To invent something as colossal as football is just incredible and I don’t feel like they have been honoured in the same way that Sheffield hasn’t been recognised.

“I love Sheffield, it’s a very special place culturally, and it frustrates me that there’s a lot of people in this city that talk a lot of twaddle. We lost the football rule book, that’s a crying shame, so we have to hang onto our cultural institutions and monetising this amazing thing we have here; our music, our culture and our sport. What an amazing thing for our city, football is from here, it’s the biggest sport in the world.

“So I think just be realistic and be humble, right? Because we’re Sheffield people, Yorkshire people. Be humble.

“You can shout about it, and be proud of it and make people sit up and take notice of it, without being silly. But allow yourself to be excited and have a bit of fun.

“It’s going to be an exciting journey, I feel we’re jumping on at a time when there’s a bit of opportunity. We’ve got the best bands, home of football, home of snooker – come on, let’s build on this.”

The Reverend is ready to make the footballing world sit up and take notice of its Makers.