It's all Greek to the enemy of the Irish

UEFA CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Like the star of an overdue promotional video for Esperanto, Steaua Bucharest manager Oleg Protasov rolled into the team's prematch press conference in Dublin with a team of translators in tow.

The 40-year-old Ukrainian has yet to master Romanian, and though he has some basic English, he is clearly uncomfortable relying on it.

His new employers, meanwhile, seem to be struggling to come up with somebody who speaks one of his preferred languages, and so we are treated to the spectacle of the coach answering questions in Greek (he has played and coached there), after which the man to his left translates his words into Romanian and the man to his left produces an English version for consumption by the media.

The system works well enough even if it produces quotes that sound like they have been spoken by somebody in their third tongue and then translated twice. Still, rest assured, this is more trouble than any Irish side - club or international - has ever gone to on its travels for the local hacks and we are suitably impressed.

Protasov is still recognisably the man who scored for the Soviet Union against Ireland in the 1988 European Championships, one of 29 goals he managed in 68 appearances for the old USSR.

On one of a number of occasions he cuts across the translation service to speak directly in English and mentions having read a newspaper article in which he is described as "an enemy of the Irish", because of the goal.

"I don't think every man scores against the Ireland can be an enemy of the Irish, can he?"

"Don't be so sure, pal," we think quietly while politely laughing off the suggestion.

Having just taken over at Steaua, tonight's game against Shelbourne will be his first competitive match in charge, but preseason has gone well with strong performances against Slovenian champions ND Gorica and Polish cup finalists Zaglebie Lublin during a spell at a training camp in Austria.

The preparations, like everything else at Steaua these days, were paid for by the club's billionaire owner George "Gigi" Becali, a former shepherd turned property magnate who became the subject of numerous stories abroad last season when it emerged he donated the money required to build a church every time his club won in Europe.

Becali, who is in Dublin for the game, is described as "religious" by some of the visiting party, but some church regulars back at home have been upset by his recent decision to commission a copy of Leonardo Da Vinci's Last Supper in which he is portrayed as Christ and the apostles are replaced by the coach (the commission actually dates back to Walter Zenga's time in charge and it is not clear whether the required changes have been made) and 11 of his players.

When he returns home there are allegations of money laundering to be faced, but Becali, who heads his own political party - the New Generation Party - and ran for president last year when he received just under two per cent of the vote, is something of a survivor.

In the meantime, Protasov knows his employer will show little patience in the event of failure and the prospect of his side bowing out of Europe at this early stage is more or less unthinkable for a man of such grandiose ambition.

He may, of course, have met his match on that, and many other scores, in Ollie Byrne.