Chris Brunt and Shawn Thornton: The football star and the ice hockey enforcer
- Published
Chris Brunt (middle), Shawn Thornton (right) and another member of the wider family, professional lacrosse player Zack Greer
Chris Brunt has 65 football caps for Northern Ireland and was a club captain at West Bromwich Albion.
Shawn Thornton was a Canadian ice hockey enforcer, two-time Stanley Cup winner with more than 700 appearances in the National Hockey League (NHL).
On the face of it the two have little in common - other than being highly successful sportsmen.
However, they share a family bond that saw them follow each other's careers from afar.
Shawn and Chris's grandmothers were sisters who remained in close contact despite being on opposite sides of the Atlantic.
But it wasn't until this summer that the cousins finally met.
"I was aware of Chris's career as he got into it and my career was probably a little bit behind his," says Shawn.
"So I followed it from afar, I'm not a huge football guy if I'm honest, but I would always see when his games were on and tune in and watch when I could."
Chris Brunt in action for Northern Ireland against Italy in 2010
In August, Chris was holidaying in New York and saw an opportunity to finally meet his cousin.
"He runs a charity for Parkinson's disease and runs a golf day up in Boston and he invited me up," he says.
"So I met him, played golf and had some food with him in the evening. It was nice to finally catch up."
Shawn says: "We had a couple of beers afterwards and we talked about some of the similarities and the differences between the two sports.
"It doesn't matter if it's on the field or on the ice, there's always a lot of similarities between good teams, good team-mates, work ethic and those sorts of things."
The pair nearly met in 2010 when Shawn's Boston Bruins played an exhibition game against the Belfast Giants.
"My mum hadn't been to Belfast since she'd left aged six, so I flew her over there for that weekend and we connected with all the family," he says.
"I think I took the whole allotment of tickets - about 30 of them - to give to family. It was an amazing experience."
However, at the time Chris was in the English Midlands with West Brom.
Signed shirt
There was some contact over the years though: Shortly after Shawn won his second Stanley Cup, Chris arranged for him to send over a signed Bruins shirt for West Brom teammate Roman Bednar.
"He was a Czech lad and obviously the Czech Republic are big into ice hockey, so he loved it," he says.
Shawn Thornton won ice hockey's Stanley Cup with the Boston Bruins
While they forged long careers, neither had success handed to them.
Chris was released by both Glasgow Rangers and Middlesbrough as a teenager, while Shawn spent much of his early career in the minor leagues before finally breaking through to the NHL.
"It's not always plain sailing, you've got to have a bit of resilience about you," Chris says.
"I always thought that was one of my biggest strengths as a footballer to say: 'That didn't go very well, but it's gone.' And you move on and do your best to make sure it doesn't happen again."
Chris played for 13 years at West Brom
It's a trait shared by his cousin.
"If you had to sum up my career, or my life, it would be resilience I'd say, 100%," Shawn says.
'Never fun to get punched in the face'
That fighting spirit is perhaps what Shawn is best known for - his role as an enforcer was to protect team-mates.
"The fighting was a means to an end - I never really enjoyed it, but I was decent at it and it got me recognition," he says.
"It was a role I adopted when I was probably about 17 trying out for a junior team and I wasn't a good enough player to make it on skill alone.
Shawn Thornton estimates he had more than 400 fights throughout his career
"I honed my craft, I think I had over 400 of them [fights] between the minors, the juniors and the NHL.
"It's never fun to get punched in the face, but I take pride in protecting my team-mates."
Retirement plans
Chris cancelled his contract with Bristol City and retired at the end of last season saying: "I just felt I wasn't doing myself justice."
He now coaches on a voluntary basis at West Brom and enjoys spending more time with his family.
Looking back on his career, he says playing 65 times for his country realised a lifelong dream, but is also proud of West Brom's Premier League run.
"I was able to be a Premier League player nine, 10 seasons - that's an achievement in itself," he says.
Shawn retired from the NHL in 2017.
"I was turning 40, even if I wanted to play some more I'm not sure anybody was going to give me a job and even if they did, I'm not sure I was prepared to mentally commit to what would be needed physically to be successful," he says.
He is now chief revenue officer for the NHL's Florida Panthers.
A keen golfer, he's eager to return to Northern Ireland.
"I would love to come back, I haven't played Portrush or County Down, so at some point I plan on coming over to play those two and a couple of others and hopefully see the family," he says.
"I have two young daughters who I'd love to come over and see where their lineage's from."