Euro (and World Cup) recounting

It is that time of an expectant summer for most of us. A time that granted,does not come around very often, but when it does, we take full advantage, be it from a business standpoint or a social one. What am I going around in riddles about? I am of course referring to qualification for major soccer tournaments, in this case Euro 2012.

The first premise of this for us was in 1988, when we qualified for,oddly enough, the European Championships,a tournament that we wouldnt see again, until..well..Sunday coming! Back in the day (well,1988) there were only 8 teams in the shindig, so I guess it felt like we werent just there to make up the numbers, we were there on merit,in out own right. In our very first match,in a major tournament setting,we were pitted against 'the old enemy' England. THIS happened.

So,a win in our first match! Expectations through the roof! No pressure,right? Naah, pressure is for tyres! Our next match pitted us against the sons of Ivan Drago,the USSR. Our 1 game winning streak came to an end, but hey, we didnt lose, and also we had THIS occur:

*sidenote - years later, I was on a table quiz team where the team name was "Oh Whelan" and was only named that because Ronnie Whelan was in the house. I didnt come up with that name.I'm sure whoever did had to stay up all night trying to conjure up that one.

Sadly,our time in Euro 88 came to an abrupt end,when we lost to a hotly contested goal from the Dutch and we were sent packing by the eventual champions of the damn thing, still, not a bad showing for a country at its first barndance.
As it is my random musings, I am going to deviate just a teensy weensy bit and include World Cups in this write up. My journalistic integrity shines yet again!!

EVERYONE remembers Italia 90. Nessun Dorma,plastic hammers,the Pope giving a shoutout to Jacks lads. The county once again,came to a halt. After Euro 88,Ireland had captured the imagination of the country,and we were getting plaudits from further afield too. As usual,interest was firmly piqued in our excersions. Jaysus,even Roddy Doyle based 'The Van' on it. But this was different. This was the WORLD CUP. The big one. The biggest football stage you could wish to propel yourself on.1990 will be remembered for the first ever red card in a final,too. But we recall it from being in one of the initial Groups of Death, with England (again), Holland (again) and Egypt (not again). We got a draw against England thanks to Kevin Sheedy,it was also the match where Gary Lineker shit himself. I'm not joking. You can Youtube it if you are that way inclined, but not a hope am I putting that up here!!

Our second match with Eygpt was one not for the plaudits by any means. A 0-0 stalemate saw us move on to our final group game against another old rival, the Dutch. Back in 1990,the 4 best third placed teams in groups got to go through. The permatations were that England were a goal up against Egypt...

....meaning that if Ireland and Holland drew their game,they both advanced,and that is what happened. England,Holland AND Ireland all went through to the next round. No Egypt though, they just became an inspiration for the Bangles. Thats a joke. A bad one, at that.
So the second round came along and we got Romania. The 25 June 1990 in Genoa. That mad shaped stadium. Where were you? It's like a JFK moment, everyone knows where they were. I was in the kitchen with my shoelaces not tied to the table (see Liverpool blog for that backstory) eagerly watching two teams cancel each other out in a human game of chess for two hours.And you know what happens after two hours with no goals? Well?

YAHTZEE!!!!!

No. Definitely not that. THIS. I'll let the video tell the whole story:

Yes, you saw that right. Ireland were in the last eight of the biggest tournament in the world,at the first time of asking. Now could we dare to dream? Maybe just a little.Sadly, dreams dont always come true, and not on a telling night in Rome, where we went up against Italy. The name Toto Schilachi became well known as Public Enemy number 1 up and down the land, even when he did that ridiculous Smithwicks ad.

So now we were starting to get a taste for tournaments, and when you get a taste, you just want more. Which brings us to 1994 in the good ol US of A for our second foray into the World Cup. It will be remembered for shocking penalty misses by Roberto Baggio and erm,Diana Ross (really). Our opening group saw us going up against Italy (again) Mexico (nada) and Norway (not fluent in Norwegian). The Italy match was always going to be tough, but thanks to a defensive masterclass at the back from Paul McGrath,we were halfway there. Of course, this helps too:

I remember being in the pub for that and the place went ballisto. I was 15 so no crafty booze for me, especially when a lad got done for going around with a bottle of Kaliber that had 0.5% and proclaimed that if he drank 200 of them,he would be fucked. Obviously money to buy these 200 bottles and potential kidney failure never came into his sums. Plus he is receeding far more than I am, so double win. Our next game saw us go up against Mexico in the searing heat in Orlando, where we came unstuck in this weather that left us transfixed, and John Aldridge nay too pleased: 

Still, we had another match to redeem ourselves, and that was against Norway,it was cat,I think its still on video at home if we ever need to cure bouts of insomnia. Even after a 0-0 bore-off with our Scandinavian buddies,we still managed to be runners up in the group, which left us with a last 16 "reward" against.......the Dutch. Were we about to exorcise past demons and send them home this time? Erm...sadly, no. I cant seem to find a Youtube clip of that one but long story short, we lost 2-0.

We wouldnt grace a tourmament stage again until 2002 where we took part in our third World Cup (we were becoming handy enough at them at this stage). This one was held in Japan and South Korea,so that meant early wake up calls and power breakfasts. This time, our group saw us pitted against Germany (efficient) Cameroon (fast) and Saudi Arabia (oily). Expectations were decent when we drew 1-1 on a Saturday morning I think it was against Cameroon:

After this we had heard that Germany had scrope a win against Saudi Arabia,just managing to score just the eight goals. Not like we were playing them next or anything? Oh. Right. Shit.
We indeed played the Germans next and I remember where I was,on my way to work with dad listening to the car radio,dropping me in as he was in town that day anyway. Germany had took the lead and everyone expected the floodgates to open.But no one expected this:

I remember the headline in the German paper Bild the next day "Keane spits into our victory beer". Fantastic stuff. Our last game was against the Saudis and confidence was high. Was a cricket score on the cards? Not entirely, but we got a few on the board. Even Gary Breen scored.

Some incident happened in Saipan all during this, but thats a story for another day (and blog,even).
We got through to the last 16 and went up against Spain, who took us to a penalty shootout. Well,we have been in this position before, what could go wrong, right? Erm....

So this time,it was us that was on the other end of the emotions of a penalty shootout. And that kick from Gaizka Mendieta was the last one we would see on a big stage until this Sunday when we kick off our Euro 2012 pilgrimage against Croatia. We have in our group, old rivals Italy and new enough rivals Spain in the mix too. We arent overly fancied, but when has that stopped us progressing before? Sometimes in sporting jousts,and in life,you need a little bit of luck. And you'd never know, we might just get it. If it gives the country a well needed lift, all the better. Fingers crossed for the lads. I hope you enjoyed this crash course down memory lane, because I loved putting little memories and snippets together.