Foul Play

Humiliated in Poland, the question begs asking: would it have been better for Ireland not to have qualified for Euro 2012?

Craig Fitzsimons, 01 Aug 2012

Back to reality. By now, all the post-mortems have been written, the dust has long since settled on Euro 2012, and all concerned will probably want to forget the entire experience as quickly as possible. I could heed my better half’s advice and just give up football, and devote this fortnight’s space to contemplation of the unfolding All-Ireland series, the imminent Open Championship or the grisly death of Glasgow Rangers. But I can’t let the summer pass without reflecting on the great epic adventure that defined it.

The last time we touched base in this space – four weeks ago, though it seems like a lifetime – Foul Play was still reeling from the solar-plexus blow inflicted by those cunning Croatians, waiting on a 5am flight to Warsaw, and doing my level best to not dwell too deeply on all the horrifying torments we suspected might lie in store against Spain and Italy.

So devastating was that first match that I think it’s fair to say that even then, with two games still to play, we knew in our hearts the game was up. It wasn’t just that we’d lost; we’d been shown up in front of millions as basically unfit to grace the tournament. We had been well aware in advance that Ireland weren’t remotely likely to boss the midfield, carve out heaps of chances or string together too many extended passages of fluent passing play. And though mildly troubling, this awareness really didn’t bother us too much: the assumption appears to have been that Shay or Dunner would bail us out when the going got tough.

Perhaps lured into a false sense of security by a 14-game unbeaten run in the lead-up to the finals (and more specifically by the fact that we’d escaped from Moscow with a point after suffering the mother of all football lessons), a widespread delusion took hold that, somehow, by hook or by crook, all would be all right on the night; that the football gods would smile on us; that you’ll never beat the Irish; that even if those silky foreigners found a way past Shay, the woodwork would come to the rescue. That, at the very least, we would be bloody hard to beat and any goals scored against us would be hard-earned.

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