Ireland, it is oft-forgotten, is a sporting nation. From football (its own football) to Hurling, boxing to football again (the world’s football), the Irish seem incessant on playing anything they can.
Often enough, they are really rather good at whatever they try their hand at. Katie Taylor is probably the best woman boxer of all time, the men’s Irish rugby team incessantly beats England at their own game and at football… well, occasionally they’re pretty decent.
To paraphrase W.B Yeats, “being an Irish football fan means an abiding sense of tragedy, sustained through temporary periods of joy.”
That’s the reality of modern Irish football on the international stage – moments of elation, enjoyed all the more because you know just how fleeting they will be.
None in recent history have been enjoyed more than that Robbie Brady header, on that one June night in Lille.
Bad cop, worse cop
At the 2014 World Cup, Martin O’Neill sat alongside Patrice Vieria and Fabio Cannavaro on punditry duty for ITV.
As Adrian Chiles presided over the panel, he gawked at the two legendary figures, trying to prise out valuable bits of analysis and footballing knowledge for the audience.
Eventually, he turned to O’Neill, who had been sitting fairly quiet for most of the night.
“Were you much in the defensive wall?”, he asked the Northern Irish football manager.
“I can imagine you in the wall with your glasses on flinching a little bit!”
O’Neill, whose academic-looking appearance is backed up by the fact he dropped out of a law degree to pursue football, released a righteously bitter response that had visibly been building up over the course of the night.
“I actually didn’t wear glasses when I was playing,” O’Neill began, as Chiles laughed nervously.
“What you’re seeing now is an older gentleman, but I did actually play the game at one point.
“Despite the fact there are two World Cup winners here, actually when it comes to European Cups, I’ve won two of them… I’d just like to know how many you guys have won?”
That time Martin O’Neill owned Patrick Vieira and Fabio Cannavaro…. oh and Adrian Chiles at the World Cup 2014.
We all wear our work hats but would love to see more of this Martin as our manager. @YouBoysInGreen pic.twitter.com/3sCoVv3v8p— Irish Football Pics (@irish_pics) May 31, 2018
O’Neill had been appointed Ireland boss just a year before, so presumably such a curmudgeonly manager was tempered with a ‘good…
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