Iron Maiden bassist Steve Harris discusses his love for West Ham United Football Club, the English professional football club that plays its home matches in Stratford, East London, in a new feature from the club.

For Steve Harris, the band’s sold-out shows at The O2 last month represented an emotional homecoming in more ways than one.

Not only were the legendary east London band playing just five miles away from the Stratford pub which hosted their first ever gig, the Cart & Horses, but they were also hosting consecutive nights in front of 20,000 fans just across the River Thames from where Harris trained for his boyhood football club as a teenager.

West Ham United Claret and Blue runs deep in Harris’ veins, and his pre-gig visit to the Hammers’ Rush Green training ground brought back many happy memories of his own schoolboy football career at Chadwell Heath and Upton Park.

The devoted Hammers fan spent nine months in the Academy of Football before he found his calling in music, and Iron Maiden’s return to London gave Harris the opportunity to pull on his boots once more on the Club’s hallowed pitches.

Still buzzing around the pitch at 67, the Leytonstone-born rocker relishes the regular matches played by Maiden FC against local clubs as they tour the globe, so their contest with a Hammers staff XI was the perfect O2 warm-up, as he told broadcaster, music journalist and fellow Hammer Mark Webster…

Read more and watch video at West Ham United.

Earlier this month, Iron Maiden have shared the video below, featuring highlights from Maiden FC's 9-4 defeat against Dortmund Legends.

A message states: "Thanks to everyone at Borussia Dortmund & Wizard Promotions for looking after us!"

The band also shared another video, with the following message attached: "A big thank you to West Ham for welcoming Steve and Maiden FC back to the East End, and for the added surprise of seeing the Europa Conference League trophy!"