Making my way around Temple Bari

How nice, I thought, they remembered.

I only wish I could.

Your correspondent spent one might in this town many moons ago, back in my freewheeling, backpacking days. My drinking days too, which is perhaps why I can’t quite recall how I ended up here or, indeed, where I was going. Bari and Brindisi were the traditional jumping off points from Italy’s Adriatic coast for the big ferries to Croatia, Greece and points further east so I have to assume I was going rather than coming.

But the only clear memory I have of this place is of sitting on the dock of the bay, watching the ships roll away, eating an ice-cream. In fact, now that I think about it, maybe I was in Brindisi. As I say, I liked a tipple now and again in those far off, happy days. (Or so I’m reliably informed).

Whatever, it’s nice to be back, if indeed I am back. Of course, the friendly “Benatori” wasn’t strictly for my benefit, nor even for the benefit of the rest of the Irish visitors who, selflessly, are doing their best to compensate local industry for the loss of one Irishman’s custom.

The welcome back was actually for the Italian team who last played here two years ago, against Scotland, and have won all seven games since they made their debut, with a 3-1 friendly win against Czechoslovakia, in the Apulian capital way back in 1947.

Which is not to say that the locals, while clearly delighted to have the Azzurri back in town, have been slow to roll out the green carpet for tonight’s visitors.

You could hardly turn a corner in the old city last night without encountering giant inflatable pints of Guinness tethered outside the innumerable hostelries dotting a lively quarter which the visitors have already dubbed Temple Bari. Some enterprising establishments went even further: behind one counter the staff were wearing green t-shirts bearing a photograph of Giovanni Trapattoni and the single word ‘Hope’. Which sounds like they’ve got the mood of the visitors about right.

One thing which is definitely making the green army feel at home is the weather. While we hear vengeful reports from home of the sun splitting the stones, our first night in Bari played host to a rumble of thunder here, a flash of lightning there and the odd torrential downpour to send the al fresco imbibers running for cover.

Yesterday was mainly grey and damp,although marginally better is expectedtoday – which is just as well since, among the special matchday attractions on Bari’s attractive waterfront this morning, is a planned beach party for Irish fans.

“It is another opportunity to cement their new friendship with the locals,” according to the publicity, and will feature music, beach games and what are rather mysteriously referred to as “gadgets for the benefit of our guests”. (Pint glasses, perhaps? Or, blindfolds to wear in the San Nicola stadium tonight?).

San Nicola, Bari’s patron saint, is one and the same as Saint Nicholas — or Santy to you and me. So cue a barrage of witty predictions in the run up to kick off ranging from Christmas coming early for Ireland to someone you know and I know getting the sack. At all costs, of course, we will be hoping that tomorrow’s headlines won’t be referring to April fools.

But let us end on a positive note, something which speaks to hope, ambition and the highest of human impulses. Former Ireland manager Eoin Hand, a 63-year-old birthday boy last Monday, has been testing all and sundry out here with the fascinating question: what are the three inventions in history which have saved the most lives?

The answers have ranged from penicillin to the parachute to “that yoke you stick on people’s chests when their heart stops.”

Eoin dutifully ponders them all, accepts one or two and dismisses the rest. Then, triumphantly, he reveals the one everyone has overlooked. “The Venetian blind,” he says, “because otherwise it would be curtains for all of us.”

I’ve another question: where’s Hal Roach when you need him?