TALKING IRISH:Packie Bonner on being the grand marshal of Dublin's St Patrick's Day parade, and Irishness in general
Have you ever met anyone, Packie, who didn't tell you where they were when you saved that penalty from Daniel Timofte?No. I'm still waiting. They're still talking about it, 20 years later. Time moves on though, doesn't it?
About half a million people greeted your arrival home from Italia 1990. Parade organisers in Dublin expect about 650,000 to turn out on Wednesday. Feeling under pressure?No, not really. I'm looking forward to it. It's a huge event, a huge cultural occasion. If nothing else, from a technical perspective, it'll be incredible to see how an operation on that scale works from the inside.
What are the grand marshal's duties? Is there any chance you could make a complete hames of the job?I'm not entirely sure, and I hope not. I've been told to turn up, smile and do exactly as I'm told. Which I'm more than happy to do.
Well, that's a philosophy for life right there.It is! My role is to represent the people of Ireland. That's a huge honour. But an enormous amount of preparation has been done, by lots of people, to make sure everything goes according to plan. My role is very small on the day.
I imagine St Patrick's Day was marked with a little less razzmatazz when you were growing up in Donegal.That's right. We'd start in the chapel with Hail Glorious Saint Patrickand Faith of Our Fathers. That would usually be followed by a small parade with marching bands. You might get an auld sweet to eat too, in the middle of Lent.
Your made your Celtic debut on March 17th 1979.Yes. It's a date that means even more to you, I think, when you're abroad than when you're at home. There was a lovely guy called George Cassidy, God rest his soul, who ran a boys' club in Armagh. He would send shamrocks to me every year. They'd arrive in the envelope flat as a pancake, but I always made sure to wear them.
The Euro 1988 and Italia 1990 successes took place at a time when there wasn't much else for Irish people to cheer about. Any parallels there with today?Of course. That's why it was so disappointing to miss out on World Cup qualification the way we did. It would have been such a huge boost for everyone, especially the younger people, to have a new generation of heroes to look up to.
Who will you be cheering for in Ireland's absence?I loved the way Spain played at the last European Championships. If they can produce the same form in South Africa, I'd be delighted to see them win.
Some say we won't have matured as a nation until we're able to cheer for our English neighbours.Well, there will always be some supporters who are pro-and anti- the English national team, even though English clubs enjoy massive support in this country. There are obvious reasons for this – history and so on. It'd certainly be nice to see England get to the latter stages. Whether we'd like to see them go any further than that . . . is another story.
What about a France v England final?In that case, we might just have to support England!
