No ideal scenario for happy Trapattoni

“GOOD news! We are all here together!”

Giovanni Trapattoni’s cheerful greeting for the Irish press corps upon arrival at his Kiev hotel yesterday summed up the manager’s buoyant mood going into today’s European Championship finals draw at the Ukrainian capital’s Palace of Arts.

After 24 years of looking on from afar as Europe’s elite have contested the continent’s biggest football prize, Ireland are finally back in the mix as one of the 16 nations who will discover later today precisely what the summer has in store for them.