Coronation Street star David Neilson who is best known to fans as iconic character Roy Cropper was seen enjoying himself immensely as he cheered on Leicester from the stands
Coronation Street star David Neilson sent fans wild as he enjoyed a day off from the soap and took in a game of football.
The ITV soap icon – known on-screen as Roy Cropper – was seen in the stands watching Leicester take on Southampton as he showed his support for his favourite premier league team. David, 75. hails from Loughborough in Leicestershire and made his affiliation with the team known while sitting in the away end at Southampton’s St Mary’s Stadium.
Fans spotted David cheering on The Foxes from the stands and filmed him getting a little carried away as he sang along with a chant containing a swear word. Leicester came from two goals behind to end up winning the game 2-3 prompting the chant as Southampton’s Ryan Fraser was sent allowing the visitors to regain control.
Roy has been a fan favourite character since he first appeared on the ITV soap’s famous cobbles nearly 30 years ago. And while he’s had some huge storylines over the years, it turns out David’s life off-screen is quite eventful too. Having portrayed Roy since 1995, he got his big break in Corrie when he was 46.
Off-screen actor David has been married to wife Jane for more than 50 years. They have a son called Daniel and are grandparents to two little girls.
And it’s Jane who has been instrumental in evolving his character, Roy. In a chat with The Mirror back in 2009, David revealed he had quietly introduced traits of autism into Roy, crediting wife Jane’s insights from her experience working as a Special Education Needs and Disability teacher.
He shared: “Roy was a psychopath. He was stalking Deirdre and was a bit scary. It’s nice to play psychos, but they don’t stay around too long.” Since 2002, David and Jane have split their time between Spain and England, allowing them to live a more normal life.
David told The Mirror: “I need to get away from Roy and be myself and they don’t know Roy in Barcelona. If I’m in Spain for a few days I forget what I do for a living, which is the important thing. It means when I come back and someone shouts ‘Roy’, for a moment I forget they’re actually talking to me. And it’s only a couple of hours on the plane so I can commute to Manchester easily enough.”
He continued: “Another reason we moved was for excitement. I like to do different things and it’s been good to learn a language and get into a different culture. Our son Daniel had left for university and we were in Bristol in a big house and we thought, ‘What shall we do?'”
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