In sickness and in health

WHAT a long, strange week it’s been.

It had all looked perfectly scripted in advance but events, dear boy, conspired to make Ireland’s first home game at the Aviva Stadium anything but straight forward. I suppose Maradona’s presence could never have been taken for granted, even when Argentina were flying at the World Cup and the great man was dispensing hugs and kisses all around, but little did we think that his Irish counterpart would also fail to make the cut, Il Trap becoming Ill Trap and missing the grand opening of his adopted home.

The medical bulletins assure us that we can afford to smile about it now but that wasn’t the case when Dr Alan Byrne unexpectedly showed up in the manager’s place at the eve of match press conference on Tuesday morning. Most of us looking up in alarm from our media seats were instantly returned to May and the last time the good Doctor had appeared before us. That was to inform the world in graphic detail of just how close to death young Shane Duffy had come the night before as a result of a freak accident in a training game at Gannon Park. So you can appreciate that it almost came as comic relief on Tuesday to hear that, at that point, the medics were inclined to attribute Trap’s hospitalisation to a case of food poisoning brought on by a plate of mussels. (The second cause for relief, of course, was when we learned that it was his native Italian, rather than, perish the thought, Irish cuisine which was getting the blame for laying him low).