Dead Stan walking?

On Tuesday the 6th of February, as snow was forecast to blanket a sun-swept Ireland from coast to coast, battle-hardened followers of the cause arrived by air into Rimini, anticipating an easy win against the European minnows San Marino. In contrast, back home, blue bereted frogs descended en mass, booking out Dublin hotels in preparation for a Sunday to remember. Our theatre of dreams, Croke Park, was set to be the venue for one of Ireland’s most historic sporting occasions!
As in years gone by, the international escapades of our boys in green herald in the start of spring, but once again we were forced to watch an all too familiar scenario unfold, as twice in five days it will be remembered that the agents of fortune and the rub of the green conspired both revive and destroy our sporting dreams. Yes, spring we now know is certainly here, Irish sport and weather coinciding, as we true patriots are once again forced to endure both the bitter, and the sweet.
A week has since passed, and it is my opinion that you may be reluctant to re-read an account of our sporting trials, but the weight of such an embarrassing performance as that of two weeks ago in San Marino requires that, out of mere national pride, I report to you the status quo.

As you well know, we are a nation of disproportionately high expectations, nowhere more so than on the soccer stage, a narrow loss to Spain in the 2002 World Cup serving only to strengthen our belief. But with time comes change, and in the FAI’s case it’s generally for the worse, John Delaney’s latest forays adequately proving my point. The appointment of the inexperienced Steve Staunton as Irish manager is merely the tip of the iceberg which has been the FAI chief’s notorious career.
As it happened, the Ginger Avenger began his reign with a 3-0 win against a Sweden side in freefall, a result which unsurprisingly led to scenes of elation in Lansdowne Road, tinged with hope of bigger and better things to come. I hesitate to say, however, that these delusions of grandeur and success have long since begun to disappear.
An opening day loss away to Germany was followed by a desperately disappointing 5-2 defeat by a team of nobodies in the shape of Cyprus, a result which saw considerable pressure heaped upon the FAI, the players, and ultimately the manager, Stan the Man himself. A country’s frustration grew from a terribly embarrassing opening, which for all intents and purposes was hailed also as the impromptu end of our European campaign.
As much as we moaned, however, a double header of home matches showed us that the lads had something to prove. A four point return following a healthy 1-1 draw with the Czechs and an encouraging 5-0 rout of San Marino left a glimmer of light shining at the end of the proverbial tunnel, and an uneasy relief that the worst had passed.
It proved, unfortunately, to be only the eye of the storm. It is ironic now to recall the words used with full assurance the country over, following that dire night in Nicosia, when pundits stated matter-of-factly that “things really can’t get any worse”. Oh how horribly wrong they were!

On a warm Wednesday night a few weeks ago, atop a mountain outside Serravalle in a little known enclave of eastern Italy, Laurel and Hardy acted out their greatest farce, and our proud team of premiership premadonnas proved that they are truly worth less in euros than the numbers on their backs!
With ninety minutes gone, even Eamon Dunphy couldn’t have predicted that the European minnows would not only have scored there first goal in over a decade, but also be threatening a draw due to the most embarrassing display of football by an Irish side since, well, Cyprus!
However with only thirty seconds remaining the eleven men in green conspired to pull the rabbit from the hat, scoring a fortuitous winner which in all fairness produced nothing more than a postponement of the stoning planned for the players following the final whistle. Yes, it was definitely a night to forget.
Yet surely it will not be forgotten, and sad is the day we look forward to the first soccer match in Croke Park, not with excitement but with anxiety. Not with hope but with fear. The collapse of an Irish side to the Welsh in front of a full house of 80,000 is a nightmare scenario we all pain to conceive.
It is tentatively, so, that this writer suggests a six point return from our next two games is not impossible, as perhaps this latest shambolic display is just the kick in the ass those lads needed to reassure them of their place in international football.
In any case, to their clubs they have returned, but it is long in the memory that this night will last. As one reporter so adequately put it, by winning the match in the last minute we did nothing more than “burgle a trócaire box!”. An apt conclusion it is too, the win served merely to rob San Marino of their dreams, and no more! Our player’s hung their heads in disgrace, the noose of public opinion not far from their minds, and yet two weeks later, the gallows remain empty. Someone’s head must surely swing for this travesty! But wait, this is of course Ireland, a country where the health service is run by a group of unapologetic, apathetic clowns, the law by incompetent, dishonest gardaí, and the country in general by a gaggle of over-paid, asinine idiots who by the looks of things spend half our annual budget down in Burger King! So yes, bureaucracy in ranks of the football association means that the inexplicable disaster which was San Marino will, almost certainly, go unpunished.
James Stuart Parnell once said “No man has the right to set the boundary to the march of a nation”. Stan’s inadequacy has surely done just that! I put it to you then that if, after this, some are still granted stays of execution, for what possible calamity will they eventually hang??
Only God knows, but at this stage in our soccer history I believe I am safe in once again saying that it really can’t get much worse…Can it?