Video: Garth Brooks fans camp out five days ahead of ticket sales in Dungannon

THE first queue for Garth Brooks tickets has started in Dungannon five days before they even go on general release.
Number one fan...Despite tickets not going on sale until Thursday, Siobhan McLaughlin heads the queue outside Stewart's Music Shop in Irish Street, Dungannon to purchase tickets for the Garth Brooks Concert at Croke Park in July. INTT0614-101ar.Number one fan...Despite tickets not going on sale until Thursday, Siobhan McLaughlin heads the queue outside Stewart's Music Shop in Irish Street, Dungannon to purchase tickets for the Garth Brooks Concert at Croke Park in July. INTT0614-101ar.
Number one fan...Despite tickets not going on sale until Thursday, Siobhan McLaughlin heads the queue outside Stewart's Music Shop in Irish Street, Dungannon to purchase tickets for the Garth Brooks Concert at Croke Park in July. INTT0614-101ar.

The group of 15 women, ranging in age from 14 to 65, are so determined to land tickets to their dream concert that they started queuing at 3.45am on Sunday morning, covering shifts around the clock, just to make sure they don’t miss out.

Their antics have even attracted the attention of Garth Brooks manager, who, on the phone from Nashville voiced his surprise that Garth’s fans would go that far just to see him.

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Raymond Stewart, owner of Stewarts Music store told the TIMES: “This is the first shop where they have started to queue for Garth Brooks tickets in Ireland.

Number one fan...Despite tickets not going on sale until Thursday, Siobhan McLaughlin heads the queue outside Stewart's Music Shop in Irish Street, Dungannon to purchase tickets for the Garth Brooks Concert at Croke Park in July. INTT0614-101ar.Number one fan...Despite tickets not going on sale until Thursday, Siobhan McLaughlin heads the queue outside Stewart's Music Shop in Irish Street, Dungannon to purchase tickets for the Garth Brooks Concert at Croke Park in July. INTT0614-101ar.
Number one fan...Despite tickets not going on sale until Thursday, Siobhan McLaughlin heads the queue outside Stewart's Music Shop in Irish Street, Dungannon to purchase tickets for the Garth Brooks Concert at Croke Park in July. INTT0614-101ar.

“They’ve been queuing from 3am on Sunday — we have never seen such a demand for tickets in our lives and we are expecting upwards of a thousand people here queuing for tickets on Thursday morning.

“One direction was a huge deal, and this is going to be even bigger than that.

“I rang Bob Doyle, who happens to be Garth Brooks manager, and he couldn’t believe it, he’s shocked, and I said ‘I want you to promise me something, I want you to promise me that you tell Garth Brooks that they’re queuing outside Stewarts Music Shop in Dungannon’, and he said: ‘sure will buddy’.

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Erin McCrory and Laura McGuckin, doing their shift in the rain, said the idea to queue so early, all came from one woman.

“Adeline McGuckin was the first one,” they told the TIMES, “we were all planning to do it on Sunday morning — Monday, but Adeline came at quarter to four on Sunday morning.

“She was afraid in case somebody else came first, so Adeline came.

“I woke up on Sunday morning to this message, and then we all came,” said Erin.

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“There would be some tears if we didn’t get the tickets, but we would like to think that because Garth Brooks manager has called that he would be able to do something for us.

“It would be brilliant to go see him live, especially in Croke Park.”

Despite the cold, the rain and the trolls who have taken to social media to ask if the women have jobs to go to, they women are in high spirits and said that it is all just a bit of fun.

“Something to look forward to,” they added, and that the reason they said they are taking shifts is because they all have jobs, and children to look after.