Irish fans were upbeat despite poor performances
Fionn O’Dea
Staff Writer
The plastic hammers have been deflated, the leprechaun costumes put away, and even the most intoxicated of fans have sobered. Our campaign has ended and the Rocky Road to Poland has been swapped for the long, sombre road back home. However, the drive home gave me time to analyse the highs and lows of our European adventure. From doing the Poznan in Poznan, to conceding four against the Spanish. From belting out The Fields of Athenry, to Mario Balotelli’s final insult. I’d be lying if I said that I wouldn’t change anything. But if I could do it all again, knowing our fate, I would in a heartbeat.
I left you last time in upbeat spirits. Right now I’m sad to have lost, but sadder to have left the bubble of the European Championships. And while I did begin to pine for my home comforts of Mighty Munch and Eddie Rockets, the hilariously named Polish snacks helped to fill the void. Special mentions go to a chocolate ice cream named Nogger and a cola named Hoop.
The football went badly, no doubt about it. I’m relieved to have been at the finals rather than suffer Dunphy and Giles who, I can only presume, had a few things to say about what was unfolding. When things got bad in the ground, we simply closed our eyes and dreamt of a team of Gary Breens. Even the idea of 11 versions of the 38 year old taking on the World Champions made it hurt less.
It is not my place to delve into what must happen for this team to move forward; it cannot be so simply put as “out with the old, in with the new.” We cannot forget that this team, by qualifying, achieved what we had failed to do in the previous four campaigns. Regardless, the national team is now moving into a transitional period. The era of James McClean, James McCarthy and Séamus Coleman surely awaits.
To take our minds of the football one day, myself and some others hopped on a bus to Kaliningrad, the Russian enclave entirely isolated from the federation’s “mainland”. Having our passports seized at the border was a sign of things to come. It was like being ID’ed at the top of the queue for a very exclusive, Russian-speaking nightclub with armed bouncers. “Not your night, lads”, they may as well have said. Story of my life. Apparently, the Russians prefer if you have a visa entering their country.
Over the course of our three games, it became impossible to distinguish between disappointment and pride. Between sadness and passion. We sang on. We sang and we sang and we waited for a fairytale that never arrived. Some stories, however, are not meant to have fairytale endings. The princess won’t always get to go to the ball. From time to time she’ll have to sit at home in her ball gown eating pop tarts and watching whatever instalment of American Pie being shown on 3e. Fairytale or not, we had a ball of our own.
Though we didn’t feel the elation of Stuttgart or Giant’s Stadium, none of the 30,000+ Irish will forget how it felt to be in Poznan and Gdansk. We were there for our country; win, lose or draw/lose, lose and lose. We travelled in numbers, sang our way into international news, and made a lot of friends. We stood up for the boys in green. And we’d do it all again.
