June 1990 – One of the most memorable months in the history of Irish sport, and soccer in particular. Ireland’s maiden World Cup tournament at Italia 1990 and the entire country came to a standstill for the month of June! After our decent showing at the Euro ’88 finals – Irelands first ever appearance in a major international soccer tournament –  Jack Charlton’s team impressively qualified for the World Cup. As the anticipation and excitement built ahead of the first match against arch rivals England on June 11^th, a wave of optimism and nationalistic fervour swept the country. Despite being in the tail end of a recession, families and communities joined together and turned streets, parks and gardens into a celebration of colour as the green white and gold was everywhere. Bunting, flags, even inflatable tri-coloured hammers! Women waved good bye to their men for a month as several thousand Irishmen spent life savings or took out loans to get to Cagliari on the island of Sardinia by any means necessary in time for our first match. Planes, trains, and automobiles. And boats of course! The 1-1 draw on a sweltering June night was not pretty to watch but was celebrated at home as if we’d won.

Six days later the optimism at home was tempered somewhat as Ireland played out a very dull and frustrating 0-0 draw in the Sicilian sunshine against Egypt, the group outsiders. So Irish fate came down to a final group match against favourites and European Champions the Netherlands, on another hot night in Palermo, Sicily. Cue high drama once again! The Dutch were packed with world stars of the highest technique and one of them – Ruud Gullit – put them ahead after only ten minutes. Ireland gradually found a foothold and Niall Quinn forced an equaliser in the second half after a goalie error. The draw put both teams through to the next round.

On June 25^th Ireland faced Romania in the afternoon sun in Genoa in the last sixteen, and after ninety minutes plus thirty minutes extra time neither team had scored. The players sizzled on the pitch, the fans had sweat buckets in the stands and back home the country overheated too as we faced into a penalty shoot out for the first time in our history. We watched through our fingers. Five successful kicks and one miraculous Pat Bonner save later, we had qualified for the quarter finals against the hosts and favourites Italy in Rome…the dream continued! And Rome is where the dream ended unfortunately, as Italy won a cagey match 1-0 in Rome on the final day of June.

Ireland were accused of negative and boring tactics in World Cup 90 by Irish and foreign media. Two goals in five matches backed up the argument. But that’s forgetting the real story, where a team had brought together a nation in economic turmoil and gave us four weeks of unbelievable pride and drama against some of the best football nations in the world. For a twelve year old like myself, it cemented an obsession with football and international football in particular. Watching my country hold their own in the sweltering Italian heat against world stars mean’t so much. And I was mesmerised too by the stars of that tournament who illuminated many cagey matches with moments of brilliance…Matthaus, Caniggia, Scifo, Stojkovic, Schillaci.

Half a million people lined the streets of Dublin city centre to welcome home the Irish team…that would have been around one eighth of the Irish population in 1990! My memories of watching that welcome ceremony on TV were not just pride but regret and sadness that we had not beaten Italy and gone further. Such was the hope the team gave us. They gave us one unforgettable summer, and their legacy went much further than that with the Irish baby boom in early 1991!