YOU learn a lot about your neighbours on nights like these. Wednesday was a tense one, and while a couple of foot of cement might muffle the shouts from next door, it doesn’t drown them out completely.
This time, we were in perfect harmony. When Denmark scored, there were cheers. When England scored, there was nothing. From that point forth, as soon as the ball went near the Danish box - which was often - the roar went up, like the dying embers of Ulster final day in Clones.
“Noooo! Get the f**kin’ thing out!”
Nerves shredded, normal run of thought made its exit too.
Indignation filled the room as England had the audacity to try and still win the game in the sixth minute of injury-time – who the hell does that? As soon as the clock hits 88 you pack it up and get ready for extra-time; those are the unwritten rules. But no!
And then, in extra-time, they scored. Prince Harry of Kane, it had to be. Denmark’s legs were gone, their bacon long cooked, the sure-fire hilarity of penalties now beyond them as they withered on the vine while Wembley found its voice.
“It’s caaaaamin ’ome, it’s caaaaamin ’ome, it’s caaaaamin…”
There was no solace to be found in the lost moments of screen staring which followed, surround sound Sam Matterface all that remained.
He told us he had no words but then, from somewhere, found loads of really awful ones and strung them together into sentences, including one gem about why England deserved this after coming out the other side of Covid.
And there, in the middle of it all, stood Roy Keane, so many times the snarling face of Irish defiance, now inexplicably trapped in the sixth circle of hell, looking down from the top tier as Declan Rice led the singing while fellow pundits frantically slobbered all over themselves and each other.
A third autobiography on that moment alone must surely be in the offing.
The thing is, see if you put aside the 10-odd paragraphs of unrelenting bitterness up above, I always thought I was ambivalent towards England’s football team. I actually thought I was ambivalent about pretty much everything (it’s been a long year).
The older you get, the less you care. So why the strength of feeling – and why now?
The whole notion that we would never hear the end should they defeat Italy on Sunday carries some weight (see the presumptuousness and entitlement of ‘Three Lions’, as well as associated Euro ’96 nostalgia). But does Irish supporters’ own sepia-tinted fondness for Italia ’90 not lend credence to a call for some slack?
Neither RTE nor the many newspapers on this fair isle need much invitation to plunder the archives and relive that glorious summer. And we, the public, are happy to lap it up time and again.
If Ireland ever managed to repeat anything close to that feat, the backslapping would be off the charts for decades to come.
England’s supporters have seldom covered themselves in glory through the years either, yet there is a sneaking suspicion that the animus this time around comes from a different place. Somewhere darker.
For most of us, 1966 is too long ago to care. The Euro ’96 stuff, you can roll your eyes and shake that off because it is, ultimately, a celebration of failure. Of falling short. Keep it coming boys, and sure keep writing the songs while you’re at it.
Yet with each hurdle overcome, and especially now with just one more to go, the fear is real.
As a long-time follower of Argentina, their Copa America final date with Brazil is the early hours of Sunday morning is causing nowhere near the angst. Having endured years of false dawns and underachievement, what’s another to add to the list? Such resignation can be wonderfully liberating.
So why is there a sense in some quarters that you must be a bit backwards, immature even, for wanting England to lose? As though, all of a sudden, irrational dislikes and tribalism no longer have a place in sport?
Irrational dislikes and tribalism are sport.
Whether we like it or not, they have fuelled it from the very top to the very bottom for generations. Those feelings go beyond reasonable thought and always have.
Take the current England group for example. As we have been regularly reminded, their squad boasts many fine, upstanding young men.
Last year Marcus Rashford twice took on British Prime Minister Boris Johnson over his refusal to provide school meals out of term time. Both times he hit the back of the net.
Raheem Sterling, one of the players of the tournament, has faced down Fleet Street bullying and racism from the stands to emerge as a shining example for so many.
In the wake of victory over Germany, Jordan Henderson took to Twitter to support non-binary England fan Joe White who went to the game as their “overtly queer” self for the first time – replete with rainbow and England flag face paint.
Then there’s Gareth Southgate himself. Our penalty hero of ’96 doesn’t ever seem to put a foot wrong. On the eve of the tournament, he spoke so eloquently of his players’ desire to take a knee in spite of those who would boo the gesture.
There is so much to admire, so much to respect - and yet none of that will matter on Sunday. It might not make sense, but then sport often doesn’t.
Forza Italia.
