One Direction fans get their gig after cancelled show

Donna Jordan and her son Declan and Mandy Dunleavey and her son Keenan were at the now infamous cancelled concert in Belfast on Tuesday evening.

The two 13 year-old boys, who both have learning difficulties, were “very disappointed” but that feeling turned to excitement once more following Wednesday’s announcement that the gig would instead go ahead tonight (Friday).

“I’m delighted that the boys will get the chance to see the band because they had got their hopes up and had been so disappointed on Tuesday evening,” said Declan’s mum Donna.

“Hopefully Liam is OK this time because they’re getting all our hopes built up again so hopefully there will be no more disappointment.”

The locals were amongst a distraught crowd at the SSE Arena on Tuesday when the concert was cancelled due to singer Liam Payne’s sickness. After that, Donna feared the boys had missed their chance to see one of their favourite bands.

He said: “It was very hard to explain to them what was going on. When they realised though, they didn’t take it well. They were very disappointed and we thought the boys weren’t going to get the chance to see One Direction again.

“We sort of knew something wasn’t right because it was dragging on and then at 8.50pm, they made the announcement.

“Even when the man who came out onto the stage and said it was cancelled, we thought it was a joke.”

On the evening, Donna wondered if the situation could have been handled differently, or even if the show could have gone on one man down.

“My husband wanted to know why the other three couldn’t go ahead and do the show? People would have understood if Liam wasn’t there,” she said. “Maybe the boys should even have come on to make the announcement themselves but if they had, they might not have got away too quickly.”

As if the night hadn’t been enough of a let down for the two local lads, they even missed out on getting on TV after their interviews with UTV didn’t make the final cut.

The boys will have the opportunity to finally get to see their heroes’ full set on Friday, even if it does cause some disruption in mum’s diary.

“The boys did have a Hallowe’en party to go to and I had a dress-fitting to go to with my daughter.

“But we’ll have to move everything about.

We’re not going to miss it,” concluded Donna.