As a nation, the only thing we do better than getting flutered abroad is acting universally indignant when an outsider (least of all a Brit) decides to denigrate our reputation. When such uppity bullshit is concerned with our ability to get flutered abroad and do it in style, that's when we're really at our best in the indignation stakes.
With that in mind, it seems we need to talk about the performance of Ireland fans vs the performance of the Irish team once again. Much of the talk in the aftermath of 2012 was whether or not the 'best fans in the world' vs 'worst team at the Euros' was a discussion worth having. Did we want to celebrate in spite of abject failure or was enjoying oneself reason enough to celebrate?
Obviously enough, we'd suggest the latter is a more fruitful way to live your life. But this is an argument about football so we'll leave the ham-fisted philosophy out of it.
Step forward Jonathan Wilson and the question of whether or not Euro 2016 has been a bit shit so far. In the aftermath of the group stage, Lukas Podolski was certainly on the side of 'when are these crap teams heading home so we can start the real Championship?'
The group stage was a little bit strange, because Uefa did some stupid things with the system. You lose the first two games and you still have a chance to get through to the next round. So it is a bit confused but for us, it doesn’t matter. Now the tournament starts.
Jonathan Wilson is a fine football writer. Personally, I don't go anywhere without a copy of 'Inverting the Pyramid' on hand to whip out a moment's notice and explain to a philistine why they know sweet fuck all about the beautiful game. And all joking aside, he really is an excellent football writer but his column in the Guardian today has certainly piqued our sense of indignation.
The sub-heading explains his point rather well;
By expanding the tournament Uefa has sacrificed quality for quantity and the deserved progress of Wales and Iceland to the quarter-finals should not obscure how bad much of the football has been.
He may even have a point when it comes to Euro 2016 and the 24 team format but that's not to say we're going to accept charges like this one lying down.
Five sides finished having come third in their groups – Turkey and then, through the play-offs, Ireland, Hungary, Ukraine and Sweden. With all due respect to Ireland’s victory against an Italy side whose performance against Spain showed how little they’d cared in that final group game, would any of them really have been missed by anybody other than bar-owners and TV crews desperate for colourful fans anticking drunkenly?
While, the talk of indignation may have been largely in jest, it has to be said that dig at Ireland's fans really has nothing to do with the point that Wilson was trying to make. So, rather than going outside the argument, let's address the question he asks, would Ireland have been missed had we not been there?
Well that depends entirely on what you want from a major championship. Granted, seeing Italy vs Spain every other game would be delightful on the eye but that's just not going to happen. No one is suggesting that we extend things out to 32 teams but has the 24 team tournament really been that bad? Has it been worse in terms of mis-matches than any World Cup for example?
The reality is that a major championship is about more than just what happens on the field. The World Cup isn't diminished by the presence of Trinidad and Tobago, quite the opposite. Major championships are events and, to be quite honest, the build up is half the fun. Having only 8 teams in the Euros again would no doubt concentrate the quality but it would take away from the experience. Quite simply, more is better (up to a point).
How exactly does seeing Belgium spank Ireland 3-0 take away from the fact that Belgium will come up against Germany later in the tournament? You still get the quality, you just have to get through more football first and why complain about that? If the likes of Ireland or Hungary do get past the 'making up the numbers' stage, then all the better.
And while we're at it, if Irish fans 'anticking drunkenly' fill in the gaps between games then so be it. I'll watch that too.
