Colin Sheridan: Ireland's heart still beats. Hope, however battered, remains renewable

Ireland’s Adam Idah scores the equaliser against Hungary. Pic: ©INPHO/Ryan Byrne

Being a Republic of Ireland football fan is less a pastime and more a neverending PhD in masochism. You don’t “watch” Ireland. You endure them, like tax returns or a Bank Holiday Monday in IKEA. Every campaign begins with hope, cascades through hubris, collides with reality, and ends with expectation gently lowered like an old dog into the boot of a Ford Granada.

And yet: Saturday night, in the Aviva, came something both familiar and absurd. Ireland went 2–0 down to Hungary - a nation that produced Puskás - only to haul themselves, improbably, joyfully, back to 2–2 in the dying embers. It wasn’t just a draw. It was a parable, a sermon on the Irish condition, a love letter to suffering.

By the time Hungary’s second goal rattled the net, most of us had already prepared the post-mortem. The WhatsApp groups were set alight like it was the 12th of July in East Belfast. Two down. At home. Against a country whose anthem is longer than some of our highlight reels.

But that’s the thing with Ireland: no collapse ever feels conclusive. The despair comes laced with a perverse anticipation, the same way you know the washing machine will eventually eat a sock. You’re furious, you’re deflated, and yet a small, stubborn voice inside whispers: “But what if?” The “what if” now wears the faces of three young men: Evan Ferguson, Adam Idah, and Chiedozie Ogbene.

Ferguson, with shoulders broad enough to carry a nation’s neuroses, doesn’t so much run as loom. Every touch hints at inevitability, every half-chance looks like it might turn into folklore. He is the lad you fear will be convinced by his club to skip Ireland duty, yet pray will choose to torment international defences in green for a decade.

Beside him - eventually - came Idah: rangy, powerful, occasionally clumsy but always willing. His equaliser was less a goal than an act of public therapy.

And Ogbene - glorious Ogbene - who demands the ball at every opportunity - a player who seems unburdened by the Irish curse of low expectations. He runs not only with speed but with intent, forcing defenders to panic in three languages. It was his darting menace that unsettled Hungary, his relentlessness that reminded us football is half courage, half chaos.

At 2–0 down, hope seemed fanciful. At 2–1, hope felt reckless. At 2–2, hope was everything. And in that escalation lies the uniquely Irish cycle: we start low, dream big, then laugh at ourselves for dreaming, then scream at the TV because the dream suddenly seems possible again.

Hubris, of course, sits at the other end of the table, sipping its pint. For every Ferguson shimmy there’s a misplaced pass. For every Idah header, a defensive lapse. For every Ogbene breakaway, a reminder that possession remains a fragile art form in green. Yet it’s precisely this emotional oscillation - the teetering between glory and gaffe - that makes supporting Ireland feel less like a sport and more like a personality disorder.

The reality: Ireland drew a World Cup qualifier they needed to win, at home, having been two goals down. In most countries, this is filed under “mildly encouraging". The expectation: that such a draw is the opening scene of a cinematic renaissance. We dare to imagine summer tournaments, green armies on continental squares, a youngster from Bettystown firing us into the quarter-finals. We make entire futures out of last-minute equalisers.

It’s delusional, yes. But expectation is the currency of fandom. Without it, why would anyone drag themselves back after decades of qualification heartbreak, of late concessions, of heroic draws that leave us stranded? Because football, like life, is not a matter of outcomes but of moments. And last night, in the 92nd minute, we were rich in them. The roar when the equaliser went in wasn’t just noise - it was relief, rebellion, resurrection. A stadium that has so often felt like a morgue was suddenly set alight.

That is why the 2–2 with Hungary matters. Not because it fixes our flaws or rewrites the rankings, but because it proves the heart still beats. That hope, however battered, remains renewable. That for every time we slump in despair, we rise again - or at least Idah does, above two centre-backs, to nod one in.

So let the record show: Ferguson is real, Idah is growing, Ogbene is joy. They are the foundation stones on which something better may yet be built. Around them, a structure is needed - steadier midfield feet,the Brentford version of Natan Collins, and a manager who believes momentum is not a dirty word.

But for now, let’s live in the draw. Let’s allow ourselves the foolishness of expectation, the comedy of hubris, the stubbornness of hope. Because to be Irish, and to love this team, is to know that the suffering is a beautiful bedfellow to joy.

On Saturday night we were 2–0 down and broken. On Saturday night we were 2–2 and reborn. On Saturday night, we were reminded - painfully, beautifully - why we keep turning up.

And if that’s not football, then what is?

Messi’s farewell was an ode to joy

There are moments in football when the game itself feels too small for the man who plays it. Last week in Buenos Aires, as Lionel Messi walked out for his final competitive home game in the blue and white of Argentina, the stadium itself seemed to shiver, as though conscious it was about to hold its breath for 90 minutes. This was not a match, nor even a farewell. It was theatre of the highest order, an opera sung on grass. 

Some 80,000 people arrived not to watch football, but to witness greatness and give thanks. Messi, the boy from Rosario who bent physics into submission, played once again with a freedom that felt like forgiveness. Every touch seemed rehearsed with God in the quiet of the morning. He threaded passes and danced with defenders as if he was gently ushering them back to their seats. 

Against Venezuela, he reminded us that his bespoke genius is not loud; it is patient, consistent, inevitable. And when he waved - to the crowd, to the game, to the impossible dream he made ordinary - you realised you were watching not just a footballer, but an idea made flesh. The idea that joy can be small, five-foot-seven, left-footed, and eternal. 

Pelé had his samba, and Maradona his thunder, but Messi gave us something else: grace without arrogance, magic without madness. He never so much dominated football as redefined it, making us believe that beauty was still the point. We are near the end with him, and the truth is, we are unlikely to see his kind again. Not in this lifetime, nor the next. 

So they stood, and they cheered and they cried, not because the game has ended, but because it has been so achingly beautiful to watch. Lionel Messi’s last home game was not a goodbye. It was an ode to joy, and to the most special player the world will ever know.

Glorious imperfection of Red Sox 

Autumn in New England, and with it comes the making of a bittersweet Boston romance: the Red Sox. Once kings of the diamond, now gloriously fallible, they stumble into the final furlong of regular season baseball like a prodigal child with dirt on its knees. The pitching is fragile, the bats as often hot as cold, and yet fans cling to hope, that stubborn, delusional spark that has defined Red Sox nation for decades. It’s the thrill of rooting for the scrappy underdog, the story that refuses logic, the team that insists on making heartbreak look poetic. It’s all very Mayo football. They may not lift the World Series in October, but this current iteration is a throwback to the Sox before they broke the curse in 2004. Battered bastards beset by glorious imperfection. This fall, they offer baseball's most compelling tale. Time to get on board the bandwagon.

Anisimova fails better

Amanda Anisimova’s journey from a humiliating Wimbledon exit to a Grand Slam final at Flushing Meadows reads less like a sports story and more like a masterclass in resolve. Tennis is cruel, unforgiving, and very public, yet she has turned disappointment into a ladder rather than a trapdoor. Every forehand she hit in New York over the past fortnight has spoken of character, of patience, of a refusal to let one defeat define a career. Samuel Beckett’s line, “Ever tried. Ever failed. Fail better,” might as well have been written for her. Anisimova failed, spectacularly, at Wimbledon. She failed better at New York in Saturday's final, but in doing so, told the world she is here to stay - and that the future, as yet unwritten, is very bright indeed.