YOU’LL REMEMBER HOW the Dublin streets pulsed ahead of the second leg of the World Cup play-off against Denmark in 2017; that strangely hectic edge which transmuted a leaden and cramped November Wednesday afternoon into an exhilarating kind of precipice.
Perhaps this is what you remember because it is all that is worth remembering. The actual game was less a defeat than it was a ruthless reproach; a whole sport putting us in the stocks to mock and tell us that what we are doing here is no longer relevant.
This mass demoralisation event was more than 3,000 days ago.
Think of how few of those days have been sparked and charged by the national team. Irish football looked to have been exposed as a non-renewable resource, colluding in its own apparent obsolescence through sheer fecklessness.
What shapes and sounds can you remember from our long gloom?
There was Stephen Ward’s voice note, and any chance of you training? There was O’Neill and Keane’s long goodbye, tangled with the bafflement at the new Nations League. A 4-1 defeat to a Wales side we’d beaten less than a year earlier. Shaun Williams. Aiden O’Brien. The freezing endgame in Aarhus when supporters were told before the game that O’Neill’s time was up.
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Jeff Hendrick and Robbie Brady in the aftermath of Ireland's World Cup play-off defeat to Denmark in 2017. James Crombie / INPHO
James Crombie / INPHO / INPHO
There was the succession plan and the succession of Sunday Times revelations. A red-eyed John Delaney hunched defensively in the stands in Gibraltar. Executive vice president: a big sign to fit across the width of the door, according to Mick McCarthy. The tennis ball protest and Oireachtas committee after Oireachtas committee and eye-watering debt figures and restated accounts and the bailout that wasn’t a bailout and EGMs leading to AGMs leading to EGMs. Happy Birthday to Declan Rice. Goodbye to Declan Rice. Congratulations to our young player of the year, Declan Rice.
The acceleration of the succession plan. Stephen Kenny taking charge of a play-off earned by Martin O’Neill for a tournament for which Mick McCarthy failed to qualify. The penalty heartbreaker in Slovakia which nobody truly remembers. The players missing because of Covid restrictions; late-night arguments with the HSE because they sat on the wrong seats on the plane and too close to a staffer who tested positive. A false positive. Social distancing and Zoom press conferences and silent grounds and noisy online squabbling.
Matt Doherty's missed penalty condemned Ireland to another play-off defeat in 2020. Tommy Dickson / INPHO
Tommy Dickson / INPHO / INPHO
Wembley and the motivational video. Goodbye to Alan Kelly and to Damien Duff. Hello to Anthony Barry. Mark Travers lobbed in Serbia and Ireland humiliated by Luxembourg, Seamus Coleman’s post-game interview a mixture of embarrassment and affront. Falling behind in Andorra, rescued by Troy Parrott. Kenny’s public gamble: I’m targeting Euro 2024.
Stirrings of hope: a heartbreaker in Portugal, Bazunu’s penalty save, Cristiano Ronaldo’s rippling torso and the quivering of the Slovenian referee Mr Jug; resounding wins in Azerbaijan and Luxembourg; fans banging on the press conference window calling for Kenny to be given a new contract.
Goodbye to Anthony Barry. A full-throated call to win the Nations League group and a lame, exhausted loss in Armenia. An emphatic win at home to Scotland and Nathan Collins’ Beckenbauer impression against Ukraine. A narrow loss to Scotland in a raucous Hampden Park. The blanched look on Kenny’s face at the Euro 2024 qualifying draw: France, Netherlands, Greece. Maignan’s despairing save to thwart Nathan Collins.
A long warm-weather training camp ahead of the game in Greece. The Irish bus beating back floods on the way to said game in Greece. Kenny standing abashed on the touchline, his face an alabaster white. Evan Ferguson injured on the day of his break-out hat-trick. Swatted aside in Paris and Amsterdam; beaten easily at home to Greece. James McClean given a farewell night against New Zealand while Kenny is bundled out the back door, telling his players that his writing was on the wall. Then followed the same writing on FAI-headed notepaper.
Jack Grealish and Declan Rice had a field day when England visited Dublin in September 2024. Ryan Byrne / INPHO
Ryan Byrne / INPHO / INPHO
Marc Canham. Jonathan Hill. A professional managerial search. A favoured candidate coming in April because of Existing Contractual Obligations. John O’Shea in interim charge. Talk of Roy Keane and Lee Carsley and Damien Duff and Neil Lennon and Slaven Bilic and Gus Poyet and Willy Sagnol and maybe it’s actually going to be John O’Shea and hang on it’s Heimir Hallgrimsson. Duff says he’d raze Abbotstown to the ground. John O’Shea still in effective charge against England. Defeat. Goals from Rice and Grealish. Would the universe care to stop taking the piss out of us?
Another couple of defeats to Greece. A comeback win in Finland. Nathan Collins in midfield at Wembley but a red card and a five-goal collapse. Beating Bulgaria for reasons known only to the mysterious Nations League. The Paddy McCarthy press conference. Heimir’s Ger Loughnane impression. We’re going to do it. We’re 2-0 down to Hungary at half-time. An opposition red card, a late 2-2 draw.
Another disaster in Armenia. Hallgrimsson’s turn to look ashen-faced and bewildered. It’s difficult to see the light. Go easy on the players. Playing for Ireland is a burden. We don’t have a sports psychologist. Do we need a sports psychologist? Why the fuck don’t we have a sports psychologist!?
Caoimhin Kelleher celebrates after saving a penalty from Cristiano Ronaldo in Lisbon. Ryan Byrne / INPHO
Ryan Byrne / INPHO / INPHO
Another Portugal heartbreaker. This time it’s Kelleher’s penalty save, Ruben Neves’ late goal, and a quivering Slovakian referee.
Another opposition red card at home to Armenia. A snooze-fest but a 1-0 win. Evan Ferguson finally looking fit and sharp.
Evan Ferguson ruled out of November. Duff popping up to say he might actually work for the FAI after all. Heimir looking like a man running out of time.
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Troy Parrott's winner in Hungary sent Ireland into rapturous celebration. Ryan Byrne / INPHO
Ryan Byrne / INPHO / INPHO
But then.
Then Troy from close range and then Troy from just inside the box and then Ronaldo’s operatic red card and then Heimir’s magnificent impassivity in the face of it all. Budapest. A goal down early on but back level and then behind again and chasing the game with little hope before Azaz scoops the ball to Parrott who lifts it over the goalkeeper and the spreading of mass Hungarian unease and a point-blank save from Johnny Kenny and that was the chance but it wasn’t the chance because Kelleher hoiked it long and Scales won the flick-on and Parrott ghosted in with precise timing to stud the ball beyond the goalkeeper and drag a stunned and beautiful silence on the Puskas Arena as he ran away hearing his screams as if he was underwater and the mass pile-on and Coleman standing soaking in the crowds’ acclaim from the Budapest skies and the bucklepping around Troy Parrott International Airport and the media interviews with Troy Parrott’s grandma and the new parrot at Dublin Zoo named Troy.
And now Prague and hopefully another Dublin midweek afternoon made long and fraught by whatever unbearable glory the night might have in store.
This is a haphazard passion of ours but it’s alive once again.
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Back from the chaos: Irish football is nervous and alive once again
YOU’LL REMEMBER HOW the Dublin streets pulsed ahead of the second leg of the World Cup play-off against Denmark in 2017; that strangely hectic edge which transmuted a leaden and cramped November Wednesday afternoon into an exhilarating kind of precipice.
Perhaps this is what you remember because it is all that is worth remembering. The actual game was less a defeat than it was a ruthless reproach; a whole sport putting us in the stocks to mock and tell us that what we are doing here is no longer relevant.
This mass demoralisation event was more than 3,000 days ago.
Think of how few of those days have been sparked and charged by the national team. Irish football looked to have been exposed as a non-renewable resource, colluding in its own apparent obsolescence through sheer fecklessness.
What shapes and sounds can you remember from our long gloom?
There was Stephen Ward’s voice note, and any chance of you training? There was O’Neill and Keane’s long goodbye, tangled with the bafflement at the new Nations League. A 4-1 defeat to a Wales side we’d beaten less than a year earlier. Shaun Williams. Aiden O’Brien. The freezing endgame in Aarhus when supporters were told before the game that O’Neill’s time was up.
There was the succession plan and the succession of Sunday Times revelations. A red-eyed John Delaney hunched defensively in the stands in Gibraltar. Executive vice president: a big sign to fit across the width of the door, according to Mick McCarthy. The tennis ball protest and Oireachtas committee after Oireachtas committee and eye-watering debt figures and restated accounts and the bailout that wasn’t a bailout and EGMs leading to AGMs leading to EGMs. Happy Birthday to Declan Rice. Goodbye to Declan Rice. Congratulations to our young player of the year, Declan Rice.
The acceleration of the succession plan. Stephen Kenny taking charge of a play-off earned by Martin O’Neill for a tournament for which Mick McCarthy failed to qualify. The penalty heartbreaker in Slovakia which nobody truly remembers. The players missing because of Covid restrictions; late-night arguments with the HSE because they sat on the wrong seats on the plane and too close to a staffer who tested positive. A false positive. Social distancing and Zoom press conferences and silent grounds and noisy online squabbling.
Wembley and the motivational video. Goodbye to Alan Kelly and to Damien Duff. Hello to Anthony Barry. Mark Travers lobbed in Serbia and Ireland humiliated by Luxembourg, Seamus Coleman’s post-game interview a mixture of embarrassment and affront. Falling behind in Andorra, rescued by Troy Parrott. Kenny’s public gamble: I’m targeting Euro 2024.
Stirrings of hope: a heartbreaker in Portugal, Bazunu’s penalty save, Cristiano Ronaldo’s rippling torso and the quivering of the Slovenian referee Mr Jug; resounding wins in Azerbaijan and Luxembourg; fans banging on the press conference window calling for Kenny to be given a new contract.
Goodbye to Anthony Barry. A full-throated call to win the Nations League group and a lame, exhausted loss in Armenia. An emphatic win at home to Scotland and Nathan Collins’ Beckenbauer impression against Ukraine. A narrow loss to Scotland in a raucous Hampden Park. The blanched look on Kenny’s face at the Euro 2024 qualifying draw: France, Netherlands, Greece. Maignan’s despairing save to thwart Nathan Collins.
A long warm-weather training camp ahead of the game in Greece. The Irish bus beating back floods on the way to said game in Greece. Kenny standing abashed on the touchline, his face an alabaster white. Evan Ferguson injured on the day of his break-out hat-trick. Swatted aside in Paris and Amsterdam; beaten easily at home to Greece. James McClean given a farewell night against New Zealand while Kenny is bundled out the back door, telling his players that his writing was on the wall. Then followed the same writing on FAI-headed notepaper.
Marc Canham. Jonathan Hill. A professional managerial search. A favoured candidate coming in April because of Existing Contractual Obligations. John O’Shea in interim charge. Talk of Roy Keane and Lee Carsley and Damien Duff and Neil Lennon and Slaven Bilic and Gus Poyet and Willy Sagnol and maybe it’s actually going to be John O’Shea and hang on it’s Heimir Hallgrimsson. Duff says he’d raze Abbotstown to the ground. John O’Shea still in effective charge against England. Defeat. Goals from Rice and Grealish. Would the universe care to stop taking the piss out of us?
Another couple of defeats to Greece. A comeback win in Finland. Nathan Collins in midfield at Wembley but a red card and a five-goal collapse. Beating Bulgaria for reasons known only to the mysterious Nations League. The Paddy McCarthy press conference. Heimir’s Ger Loughnane impression. We’re going to do it. We’re 2-0 down to Hungary at half-time. An opposition red card, a late 2-2 draw.
Another disaster in Armenia. Hallgrimsson’s turn to look ashen-faced and bewildered. It’s difficult to see the light. Go easy on the players. Playing for Ireland is a burden. We don’t have a sports psychologist. Do we need a sports psychologist? Why the fuck don’t we have a sports psychologist!?
Another Portugal heartbreaker. This time it’s Kelleher’s penalty save, Ruben Neves’ late goal, and a quivering Slovakian referee.
Another opposition red card at home to Armenia. A snooze-fest but a 1-0 win. Evan Ferguson finally looking fit and sharp.
Evan Ferguson ruled out of November. Duff popping up to say he might actually work for the FAI after all. Heimir looking like a man running out of time.
But then.
Then Troy from close range and then Troy from just inside the box and then Ronaldo’s operatic red card and then Heimir’s magnificent impassivity in the face of it all. Budapest. A goal down early on but back level and then behind again and chasing the game with little hope before Azaz scoops the ball to Parrott who lifts it over the goalkeeper and the spreading of mass Hungarian unease and a point-blank save from Johnny Kenny and that was the chance but it wasn’t the chance because Kelleher hoiked it long and Scales won the flick-on and Parrott ghosted in with precise timing to stud the ball beyond the goalkeeper and drag a stunned and beautiful silence on the Puskas Arena as he ran away hearing his screams as if he was underwater and the mass pile-on and Coleman standing soaking in the crowds’ acclaim from the Budapest skies and the bucklepping around Troy Parrott International Airport and the media interviews with Troy Parrott’s grandma and the new parrot at Dublin Zoo named Troy.
And now Prague and hopefully another Dublin midweek afternoon made long and fraught by whatever unbearable glory the night might have in store.
This is a haphazard passion of ours but it’s alive once again.
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