Martin O’Neill: John Delaney persuaded me on new deal

Rep of Ireland v Sweden

In the cool shade of the stand, hundreds of local school kids and ex-pat youngsters who’d been given tickets by the Irish embassy in Paris, did the Mexican Wave, chanted ‘Allez Irelande’ and screamed repeatedly for ‘Robbeee’.

Down on the pitch, where there was no escape from the unforgiving sun, the same Robbie and the rest of the Irish squad — minus Jon Walters who continued to do his own thing under the watchful eye of a physio — worked up a prodigious sweat in a high- intensity training game.