From D’oh! to Doha
Run of the mill comedians live in mortal dread of dying on stage but the true immortals won’t even let the Grim Reaper himself have the last laugh. So let’s have a big, hearty posthumous pie in the face for Leslie Nielsen, whose passing gave rise to the welcome phenomenon whereby, for once, the nightly news on telly — or ‘Doomwatch’, as it’s now officially known in our house — had us hooting with mirth rather than contemplating the pistol and the bottle of hooch, as they reprised some of the great man’s greatest hits.
“This woman has to be gotten to a hospital.”
“A hospital? What is it?”
“It’s a big building with patients but that’s not important right now.”
Ah yes, sadly he won’t tell ’em like that anymore but, after 60 years in the business they call show, the greatest compliment you can pay thepoker-faced funnyman is that even in death he still managed to lift the collective spirit.
Mind you, all those zingers from Airplane and Naked Gun weren’t the only rib-ticklers of the week.
All that was missing from Thursday’s big do in Zurich was a cameo appearance by Lt Frank Drebin, as Sepp and the gang has us rolling in the aisles as only they can.
How can you not love an organisation whose high-powered executive committee can accommodate men called Angel and Blazer? That would be Chuck Blazer, the representative from the nation which has previously given us the splendidly named team manager Bruce Arena, and Spain’s Angel Maria Villar Llona who ran away with the OBN gong when he declared: “I love FIFA dearly but those I love the most are my colleagues in the exco.”
But, unlike an Oscar-winner, Angel doesn’t just do gush. “Recently, we have been criticised by many media outlets,” he went on, baring his pearly whites.
“Unfortunately for them FIFA is a clean institution.”
In other words, it was the Sunday Times and the Beeb wot lost it for Blighty. Or so the aggrieved consensus across the Irish Sea would have it.
Since we haven’t come out so well in some of our own battles with FIFA we can sympathise with our neighbours, but the problem for the conspiracy theorists is that, while they have legitimate grounds for suspicion on the basis that England’s impressive bid managed only a humiliating Eurovision-style deux points, it’s still hard to knock the inherent logic of taking the World Cup to Russia for the first time.
In truth, on a day which went from D’oh! to Doha, the real shock came with the announcement that the 2022 World Cup will be held in Qatar.
Again, FIFA’s expansionist ambitions — sorry, I mean desire to spread the joy — would appear to justify the first ever Middle Eastern World Cup but even the organisation’s own technical report had raised concerns about the ferocious 50 degree heat which is the norm in the hottest months of the year in that part of the world.
The chief executive of the country’s bid has spoken of “proposed air-cooled solutions” for stadiums, training sites, fan zones and other outdoor areas but the whole thing has the feel of a laboratory experiment in which the players will be the guinea pigs.
And that’s before we even get to the thorny issue of how a Muslim state in which kissing and drinking in public are both illegal will cope with the influx of football supporters who have, shall we say, a more relaxed attitude to such leisure pursuits.
Should Ireland make it to those finals, one can imagine the Green Army just about handling the ban on smooching. But their likely response to a culture of teetotalitarianism simply boggles the mind.
Then again, one can’t help wondering what the good people of Qatar would make of having to spend a month in our neck of the woods. Not that we need to worry about such a scenario in the near or long-term future or even until the present Ice Age has run its course.
No, for now, we must be content with the smaller but not inconsiderable coup of landing the Europa League final for Dublin next year, the official launch of which took place in the magnificent National Convention Centre this week.
At times, there was something of an Alice In Wonderland feel to proceedings with Minister Mary Hanafin enthusing about how the visiting teams, delegations and supporters will be whisked through a brand-new terminal, along a brand-new motorway, through a brand-new tunnel to a brand-new stadium. Fraternal greetings to our friends in the showcase city of Pyongyang! Not for the first time, one was struck by the thought that the authorities are lucky that so many prestige projects were completed just before the bottom fell out of everything — otherwise, the country’s official logo might well have been a soaring motorway flyover which ends in mid-air.
Still, we shouldn’t be churlish. The Europa League final in Dublin next May is something to be celebrated. Granted, it looks we might have to wait even longer than poor old England before we ever get a chance to host the Mundial here but, as we don ski boots and parka before heading out into the blizzard — and, frankly, we might be gone for some time — we can cheer ourselves with the thought that we’ve already got the really essential stuff in place for Ireland’s first ever Winter Olympics.
- Contact: liammackey@hotmail.com
