Euro 2012 Diary
If only our Euro campaign reaches a conclusion as happy as the story of Irish fan Damian Coughlan yesterday.
En route to Poland, the Dubliner popped into the Champions Sports branch at Dublin airport, where he dropped a potentially-disastrous clanger, leaving all three of his Ireland match tickets behind.
Credit to Champion Sports, they immediately alerted airport staff who attempted to alert Coughlan to his own-goal via a series of announcements, which he apparently didn’t hear as he boarded his flight happily oblivious to his plight.
Cue police involvement and a search for friends and relatives of the 23-year-old, which grew further legs on Twitter as all kinds of volunteers queued up to take the tickets off the DAA’s hands.
Thankfully, Dublin Airport later announced that a solution had been found.
“A friend of Damian’s is travelling out this evening, and he’s en route to pick up the tickets now,” said a spokesman.
Poland were out of the traps quickly in the tournament’s opening game; leaving pundits to wonder just what the home side’s players had got up to on Thursday night. Before the game, Polish gaffer Franciszek Smuda had set his stall out on the thorny topic of WAGs at the team’s training camp, insisting his charges were free to enjoy as many conjugal visits as they pleased — just as long as visitors don’t bring a bottle. “It’s better to have bunga bunga than to abuse alcohol. Alcohol just blows my fuse.”
Believable, Jeff
Gary Lineker knows his own mind, or does he?
“Unbelievable support for Poland, as you’d expect.”
Not everyone in Poland is pleased to be hosting the Euros. The country is still reeling from that Panorama ‘Stadiums of Hate’ documentary, so PM Donald Tusk attempted to win back hearts and minds by staging a lunch at Nigerian-born Polish politician John Godson’s house, before the pair fielded a live press conference in which Godson assured journalists he’d never had any problems as a black man in Poland.
Alas, that was the cue for a pair of Widzew Lodz ultras to rock up on camera carrying flares and flying a ‘Fuck Euro’ banner.
Then, before yesterday’s opening match in Warsaw, feminist group FEMEN — who are highlighting the plight of women in the Ukrainian and Polish sex trade — struck with their latest topless protest. Again the bare-chested lady detained by security was shouting a familiar and unmistakable message; ‘Fuck Euro’.
You almost feel they’d happily settle for the customary quarter-final exit on penalties this time round, but Gary Lineker has led the clamour for England to be more diligent when it comes to penalty practice this tournament.
“Come on Roy, make them practice pens. 20 a day minimum. Can’t do any harm. You never know!”
He might be disappointed, however. At the open training session carried out at England’s Hutnik base yesterday morning, it was quickly evident to onlookers that their pitch had not been equipped with penalty spots.
Clean sheets
Hang on, time for a quick reminder from Graham Taylor that we can’t quite write off the defensively sound English just yet:
“We have had two successive 1-0 wins without conceding”.
Nineties nostalgia tweet of the day after the Polish keeper saw red:
@irisht84
“Szczesny Walks.” #Euro2012
As we lounge in some degree of comfort in front of our televisions, it’s easy to overlook the appalling conditions endured by our intrepid heroes on the front line. Ronnie Whelan has certainly been doing it tough in Warsaw, as he told George Hamilton at the beginning of RTE’s coverage:
“I missed my afternoon nap because of the car horns blowing outside.”
The insight was coming thick and fast on BBC during the opening exchanges. First up was Alan ‘40k’ Hansen: “There’s a chance for somebody to go and win this game.”
Then Mark Bright was on hand to draw on his wealth of international experience: “Most players will tell you they don’t want to lose the opening game.”
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