Dion Fanning: Ireland hope to escape the tyranny of the present

Ireland v England isn't a rivalry at the moment, but an encounter between two countries playing different versions of the same game.

GAME ONE: Head coach Heimir Hallgrimsson during a Republic of Ireland training session at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. Photo by Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile

When Ireland beat England at Stuttgart in 1988, Philip Greene, the retired RTÉ commentator, sat in the stand at the Neckarstadion and wept.

“We laughed and cheered and hugged each other like liberated people who had escaped from tyranny,” he said later.