Brendan Gallagher has fond memories of one of rugby's "cathedrals" in Llanelli. Read his farewell message to Stradey Park in The Daily Telegraph.
"A massive housing estate is planned there now but the human drama therein will never match that we witnessed and experienced at Parc Y Stradey over the last 129 years. Victory, defeat, hope, despair, honest graft, committee room rows, romance, life and even death. Almost a year to this day we gathered to commemorate Ray Gravell whose public funeral at the ground proved such an unexpectedly uplifting occasion. The capacity to surprise and inspire has always been a Stradey trait.
"In the land of chapel, Stradey has been an open air cathedral, somewhere for believers to congregate and air their faith. Those who believe in Welsh language and culture, running rugby and the urgent need for wine and song whenever emotions, happy or sad, need to be voiced.
"Those who believe in miracles - and have occasionally witnessed them on the pitch - but also practical sons of the Carmarthenshire soil, dockers and steel workers who have known bloody hard times and appreciate that fighting the good fight is what sees you through life when the odds are stacked against you. Stradey was their Saturday afternoon playground, where they went to be diverted - delivered even - from their everyday grind. Which is possibly why Llanelli have always been under huge pressure to perform and entertain as well as win."
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