Euro 2012 Diary
Just as Once The Musical was accumulating eight Tony Awards on Sunday for its tender portrayal of Irish and Eastern European love, another touching tale of old-fashioned romance was playing out in Poland.
We can’t keep you abreast of the details at this end of the paper, but you will probably have seen by now the photograph of young Kildare man Eamon Keegan getting to know rather intimately a couple of Croatian ladies who appeared quite warm in themselves on Sunday evening in Poznan.
Word of Keegan’s exploits quickly spread after Irish goalscorer Sean St Ledger marvelled at the youngster’s chest control, tweeting “Take a bow my son!” and “Let’s make him a twitter/internet sensation.”
The Ledge got his wish and Joe.ie caught up with Keegan yesterday for a rundown on the beautiful wooing rituals of modern courtship. “We were all in Poznan, with all the Irish fans at the game and these two Croatian girls walked through and everyone started singing ‘Get your t*ts out for the lads’ and they actually did.”
Alas, not all the women in Eamon’s life may be as appreciative of his silver tongue. He later tweeted himself: “#theawkwardmoment when your mother sees you licking diddies on the internet!”
If there was a single good news story from the opening series of matches at the Euros, it was surely our great escape from the usual interminable, rasping drone of the England band.
The intrepid buglers have been a fixture at England matches since 1996 — blasting out the jaunty Elmer Bernstein theme at regular intervals, even as their team’s hopes are invariably imprisoned once more.
The 10 members had driven the 2,800 miles to Donetsk to take up their positions for England’s opener with France, but stewards at the Donbass Arena quickly confiscated their instruments on the basis that they were a security risk.
A blow for the band, but the wave of sympathy they might have expected across the water doesn’t appear to have materialised. Last time we checked, a Daily Mirror poll had 68% voting “Peace at last, hide their instruments” with just 32% wanting them back for England’s match with Sweden.
Disappointingly, RTÉ commentator Stephen Alkin appears to have misplaced his dossier containing the names and addresses of all supporters attending Euro 2012: “There’s a happy young man — he’s come from Prague or possibly somewhere else in the Czech Republic.”
A magnificent effort from the people of Sweden yesterday as they worked together to create an invaluable instructional guide for Celtic’s Mikael Lustig, who will never again let go of the near post if he’s stationed there at a corner kick.
Patrice Evra accused them of ‘doing a Chelsea’ and for a moment on Monday it appeared England were set to replicate to a tee the Blues’ tactics in the Nou Camp — they lined up for the official team photograph with just 10 players.
Who was the missing man? Never noted for his positional sense, video evidence shows Glen Johnson race away in the opposite direction as soon as the anthems finished.
All kinds of commercial interests have been jostling for attention during these championships but British firm Gr8fires are in the running for most imaginative — and tenuous — marketing message.
In Monday’s Guardian, Andriy Shevchenko’s uncle recalled young Sheva played with a ball before he could walk, then regularly played football in his kitchen until the day he ran into a stove door and gashed his head. “Maybe that was a sign from heaven. After that… he would be out in the yard the whole time thrashing a ball against the wall of the drying house. The rest is history.”
And this, then, is where Gr8fires worked an angle to shoot: “We can’t promise that you’ll have the next Shevchenko on your hands if you buy a wood-burning stove, but it might be worth a try!”
Evra might see them as Chelsea but England reminded French sports paper l’Equipe of another London club: “We knew about boring Arsenal from before Arsene Wenger. Now there’s Roy Hodgson’s boring England.”
Stats firm Opta had the numbers to back up the French view. After the first round of matches, England had mustered fewest attempts on target of all the teams at Euro 2012; just one — Joleon Lescott’s header.
During Greece-Czech Republic, there was a sharp reminder of the acumen and presence of mind that once earned Brian Kerr the Ireland job: “I’d prefer a two-goal lead than a one-goal lead. If you concede a goal when you’re 1-0 up, you’re drawing, but if you’re 2-0 up you’re still leading.”
Another day at Euro 2012, another race row. As the Irish bandwagon rolled onto Gdansk, they were greeted by a radio broadcast from deputy mayor Andrzej Bojanowski, whose diplomacy probably ensured the mayor will hang onto his chain for a while yet.
“I thank residents and city employees for behaving like normal civilised white people toward our guests who have in turn also behaved like normal white people.”
Bojanowski later apologised in a local newspaper: “I apologise to anyone I may have hurt with the clumsy phrasing I used this morning in a live broadcast. I simply wanted to thank residents and guests, whatever the colour of their skin.”
Look out everyone, Today FM’s Tony Fenton is loose in Poland and he is seriously in the know: “1988, the year Euro ’88 took place.”
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