The Liberation of Paris was underway in earnest yesterday, as life in the city returned to normal after its 48-hour occupation by Irish football supporters, writes Frank McNally in Paris.
The smell of roasted chestnuts wafted once more through the Jardin des Tuilleries. Booksellers plied their trade on the quays of the Seine. And, as they have done for centuries, Parisians queued for baguettes on Sunday morning, apparently confident that it was safe to come out again.
Pockets of men with leprechaun suits and plastic hammers were reported to be holding out in parts of the city. Others exchanged their green hats for black berets and tried to pass themselves off as locals (they stood out a mile). But the majority of the invasion force - put at 40,000 - was in retreat, carrying the World Cup point plundered in Saturday night's 0-0 draw at the Stade de France.
The key traffic artery of Boulevard de Clichy, which contains the strategic Moulin Rouge as well as a number of Irish pubs and had been held for two nights by the visitors in the face of heavy resistance from local motorists, was again in the hands of the French.
Truth to tell, Paris shrugged off its latest invasion without that much difficulty. And as the city begins the work of rebuilding its badly-depleted beer reserves, residents may conclude that the only real damage done was to France's World Cup qualifying hopes. By contrast, the Republic of Ireland's look bright after what must surely be the most expensively-won point in Irish soccer history.
The French sports newspaper L'Equipe estimated that 1 per cent of the Republic's population attended the match, creating what it called "une formidable ambience" in the Stade de France. Unable to secure direct flights or London connections, many fans flew to Brussels and even Barcelona, before descending on Paris in a pincer movement. Not even the havoc wreaked on their arrangements by Irish mobile phones being unusable for most of the weekend - suspected to be the work of the French resistance - prevented the visitors achieving their objective of transforming an away fixture into a home one.
Surveying the stands before the game, the face of French coach Raymond Domenech seemed to turn the same colour as most of the supporters shirts. And with the stadium still resounding to a lusty version of Amhrán na bhFiann, the Irish team played as if they were in Dublin. They quickly retaliated for the mobile phone sabotage by cutting off communications between the French midfield and Thierry Henry, while at the opposite end of the pitch, the eccentric Fabian Barthez was busy enough to be judged L'Equipe's man of the match.
The draw was so comfortably achieved that there was a definite air of anti-climax among Irish supporters after the game.
Meanwhile, the other main contest of the weekend also finished scoreless. Homicidal Parisian drivers certainly had their chances, but somehow the Irish fans always seemed to get out of the way just in time. Everybody agreed that a nil-nil draw was probably a fair result.
