The Lost Shoe Diaries - Part VIII

I’m a firm believer in protocol. For instance, I don’t mind at all if everyone stands up when I walk into a room. But there are moments when protocol can go and take a jump. I hugged the President. You might have seen it on the box. I hugged a President and I liked it.

It was one of those moments when you get an urge and you act. It was pure instinct. Up until the minute Robbie Brady scored, I was convinced that it wasn't going to be Ireland's day. As a matter of fact, in my head, I was already composing a letter of complaint to Uefa about the incident in the first half when James McClean was thrown to the floor by an Italian defender.

My good friend, the member of the FAI officer board, must have noticed my lips moving as I composed this missive in my head, because he said, “Make it one of your good ones – lots of henceforths and forthwiths.”

“Oh, there’ll be plenty of both,” I said, as my mind turned to the question of how many millions I should ask for not to sue them. Thierry Henry’s bit of blaggardry was worth five, based on one for every finger he used to cheat us out of a place at the World Cup, not that I’m one for dwelling on the past . . . the crook.

But that was nearly seven years ago in the middle of a global economic crisis. So what’s the current going rate? I decided to ask for twenty million. There’s no harm, I thought. If you ask for ten, you might only get five. But if you ask for twenty, sure you might get the ten you originally wanted.

"Say there's a conspiracy against us," the officer said. "Put in how Ireland is a small nation and how we can't get a fair shake of the stick when we're playing against the big boys – the like of France and Italy."

“That’s all going in.”

“Much are you looking for this time?”

“I was thinking twenty million.”

“You may as well ask for twenty. If you ask for ten, you might only get five.”

“That’s the way I was thinking.”

I still hoped against hope that I wouldn't have to send the letter, especially with us bossing the Italians in the second half. Behind me, I could hear President Higgins saying, "I feel like it's only a matter of time before we make the breakthrough."

He’s a Galway United man, of course. It must be habit-forming, thinking like that.

With ten minutes to go, I have to admit, I’d just about given up the ghost. And to think, I’d brought an extra pair of shoes with me as well for the post-match session.

Foldable flats

It was a pair of those foldable flats that women stick in their handbags when they’re going to a wedding and they don’t want to be dancing all night in the heels.

I thought, lookit, if the fans want to do the usual and drink out of my George Webbs, at least I won’t have to walk back to the hotel in my stocking feet in the pissings of rain.

A lot of the job of a football administrator is anticipating problems before they arise.

But now I wasn't going to get to wear the foldable flats, which were in my inside pocket, and that made me angry. I thought maybe I'll throw them at Antonio Conte at the post-match press conference.

And that’s when Wes Hoolahan found himself suddenly one-on-one with the Italian goalkeeper. We all held our breaths.

“I told you!” the President shouted. “I had a feeling he’d . . .”

Wes struck the ball straight at the keeper.

‘Bobbled’

My other friend, the member of the association staff, had no doubt as to what happened.

“It was the pitch,” he said. “The ball bobbled.”

“It did seem to bobble,” I agreed.

“Look at the state of the surface,” he said. “They wouldn’t ask France to play on a pitch like that.”

“You’re right,” I said. “Wes wouldn’t have missed that if this was the Stade de France.”

“I’d add another ten million in that letter.”

“And the rest.”

“Another twenty, is it?”

“I was thinking of asking could we be the 17th team in the Round of 16.”

“The 17th team in the Round of 16? How would that work?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t fully thought it through.”

“Seventeen’s an odd number – like, who would we play?”

“Maybe we’d step in if one of the other teams got sick.”

“Sick?”

“That’s right.”

“The entire squad?”

“Well, there’s that Zika virus, isn’t there? I don’t know if it’s here. Again, I’m talking off the top of my head here.”

And that’s when the stadium erupted. I looked up and I noticed that the ball was in the back of the net and Robbie Brady was running to the crowd. I threw my arms around the President. I went with it.

Then I reached into my jacket and pulled out the flats. And I said, “It looks like I might be needing these after all.”