Not even in our dreams. Not even in our dreams did we see this coming. The lucky 50,717 in the Aviva for what was Ireland’s best home win in a decade got to be part of a truly joyous night, when Troy Parrott wrote his name into Irish legend. As a bonus they also were present at another historic moment – the first sending off of a billionaire international footballer.
If someone had told you before the game that the player wearing number 7 would win the game by scoring twice in the first half, you wouldn’t have been surprised. But it was Parrott and not Ronaldo standing there at the end holding the man of the match award. “It’s probably the best night I’ve ever had in my life,” he told RTÉ. He might not have been the only one.
Parrott had missed the first two matches of the qualifiers with a hamstring injury. Maybe we didn’t realise at the time what a loss it was. Playing a lone striker role in place of the injured Evan Ferguson, he scored with a clinical close-range header from a set-piece and then sent Portugal reeling with a superbly taken second just before half-time.
Afterwards the players – who so often finish these games lying on the pitch in numbed disappointment – took a lap of honour to a full, cheering stadium – the first one of those here in many years. A win like this has been a long time coming for this team. Parrott spoke for them: “It’s just an overwhelming feeling and relief to see the hard work paying off.”
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The first few minutes had looked as grim as most of us expected it to be. Portugal monopolising the ball, Ireland crouching behind it, they looked patient, we looked determined but basically hopeless.
Then in the ninth minute, something interesting happened. A Portuguese attack ended with the ball in Kelleher’s hands, and the Irish keeper booted a long flat clearance upfield towards Finn Azaz, who was running down the right wing totally free. It was as though Portugal had forgotten that Ireland could also attack and hadn’t bothered to recover their positions. With Ogbene screaming for it in the centre, Azaz wasted the chance, his pass cut out by Goncalo Inacio. We didn’t know it then, but this was a portent of things to come.
A few minutes later Coleman intercepted and played Parrott through down the right for a similar sort of chance. Again it came to nothing but the crowd were excited now. They roared to encourage Parrott as he set off on a 40-yard dash into the box to put pressure on Diogo Costa.
It was one of those runs you make to force the keeper to play it early. Costa stayed calm – too calm! – and suddenly Parrott was on him, charging down the attempted clearance. As Parrott collected the loose ball, Costa seemed to bundle him over from behind.
Josh Cullen fizzed a deep delivery to the far post, Liam Scales left his marker Joao Felix behind and sent a precise header back across goal to Parrott, who steered it in from a yard out. It’s funny how a well-executed set piece can make scoring a goal look so easy.
There was another Irish chance on 37 minutes when what looked like a clearance from Dara O’Shea turned into a dangerous through-ball for Chiedozie Ogbene, who hit the post. In the last minute of the first 45, Parrott took flight.
Kelleher cleared it long, Portugal headed it back over halfway, and Dara O’Shea clipped it over the top, into that huge space behind the Portuguese defence Ireland had been getting into all half. The defensive line was slack and Parrott ran on to the ball, onside, moving down the left. He had two defenders in front of him but made what followed look so easy. First he slowed it down, then he sped it up, and a low finish arrowed into Costa’s near corner.
The Aviva has never looked like it did at half-time of an Ireland match, the fans celebrating almost the same way they do following a goal. People couldn’t believe this and were going to enjoy it while it lasted.
Incredibly, it was to get even better.
The second half began promisingly when Vitinha missed a huge chance with a miskick at the far post. Ireland were defending well, getting in front of everything. Portugal were rattled and hitting a lot of shots miles over the bar. In the 40-year old brain of their greatest-ever player, an electrical storm was starting to build.
The match-defining moment arrived just before the hour, and the crowd behind the goal saw it all. Most of us just saw Dara O’Shea lying on the ground and Ronaldo standing over him, gesticulating. “Pushing, pushing, pushing!” he was shouting. O’Shea had been pushing him all night. So Ronaldo had – pushed him back? It must have been a good push by the way O’Shea was still lying there writhing in pain.
And Ronaldo, by the way he was justifying himself, had clearly done something. The Swedish referee, Glenn Nyberg, showed him a yellow card – but the crowd behind the goal were screaming for justice. The players gathered around the halfway line as Kelleher prepared to kick off again. But then the referee told him to wait.
The red “POTENTIAL RED CARD CHECK VAR” warning went up on the big screen and excitement – and hilarity – started to boil over in the stands. The replays confirmed what the fans behind the goal already knew. Ronaldo had lashed out with his elbow at O’Shea. The referee was over at the VAR screen watching it now. Everyone knew what was coming.
Nyberg walked back on to the field, slowly took the red card from his back pocket, and sent Ronaldo off. People roared with disbelief, people roared with laughter, people mimed crying. The downside of being the most famous man alive.
For the third home match in a row, Ireland’s opponents had taken a straight red card. Last year – after seeing incidents like Evan Ferguson getting fouled in the penalty area at Wembley and hardly even appealing – we talked about the need for Ireland to be nastier, more annoying, more “cynical” – to use a word Hallgrímsson used on Wednesday. Mission accomplished on that front. This was O’Shea’s second scalp of the campaign: it was he whom Roland Sallai had lashed out at for his red card in the Hungary game.
Ronaldo, maybe already realising that he is now likely to receive a three-match ban which would cost him the first two matches at the World Cup, was not ready to go quietly.
As he made his way off, he saw Heimir Hallgrímsson. On Wednesday the Ireland manager suggested that Ronaldo had “refereed the game” in Lisbon. An angry exchange followed. It looked like Ronaldo was telling Hallgrímsson something along the lines of: “you did this!” The Ireland manager protested, maybe pointing out it wasn’t he who had elbowed O’Shea.
The shouting match suddenly ended in a handshake. Possibly it had just occurred to Ronaldo that he shouldn’t do anything that might complicate his appeal. One can only imagine Gianni Infantino’s reaction to the news that the world’s most famous man will be forced to sit out two-thirds of the group stage. Maybe a pardon is already in the works. Maybe Trump can intercede.
And maybe Ireland will be there? At last, at long last, this generation of Ireland players have a victory we will all remember to the end of our days. Has it come too late to get them to the World Cup? We’ll see.
