Right time to sign off. I think this tweet sums up the feelings of the nation. See you in Poland in June and thanks for staying with us.
Trap says he is happy and “all is possible”. He is confident too, saying he “knows Italy” but Spain are “strong”. Kind of an understatement there.
Kevin Doyle is excited and looking forward to it. So are we if we are honest. England beat Spain a few weeks ago so surely we can too.
Keith Andrews admits its tough draw. When asked about playing against Xavi and Iniesta, Andrews says he is looking forward to it. But he fancies us against Croatia and Italy.
We were 50/1 to win the thing before the draw. Drifted to 66s now. England gone from 11s into 9/1.
1806:
So after Croatia on June 10 we play Spain on June 14 and Italy on June 18. Book your holidays and adjust any wedding plans you may have had accordingly.
First and last game is in Poznan, Spain game is in Gdansk by the way.
1803:
A small recap of all the groups:
Group A: Poland, Greece, Russia, Czech Republic.
Group B: Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Portugal.
Group C: Spain, Italy, Republic of Ireland, Croatia.
Group D: Ukraine, Sweden, France, England.
If England win their group and we finish second we play them in the quarters. Something to aim for there folks
1800:
The Dunph thinks the draw is interesting, not terrifying.
1758:
So its Croatia Sunday June 10 first up.
England are last out so they have Ukraine, Sweden and France in Group D. Not too bad.
Italy finish our group. So that’s Spain, Croatia and Italy for us. Not easy is it.
Germany in with Dutch, Portugal and Denmark. Ouch
Russia in A with Poland, Greece, and Czechs. Easy looking to us.
Sorry, BBC got it wrong. It will be Croatia up first for us.
Trap looks pissed off in the crowd. Next team into our group will be the opening game for us.
Croatia in with us and Spain. Not getting much easier to my mnd.
Portugal in with Denmark and Netherlands in B. Tough.
Greece in with Poland and the Czech Republic in Group A. Nice one for the hosts there. Opening game will be Poland and Greece. Not great is it.
We are going to be based in Poland though. France are in with Ukraine. Well, well, well.
It’s Spain for us. Spain. I think I speak for us all when I say ****
Denmark in with Netherlands. Spain or Ukraine for us now.
Czech get Poland. Damn.
Poland in A and Ukraine in D. The first ball, drawn by Van Basten, puts Netherlands in Group B and Spain in C.
Right here we go. Brace yourselves
Right here we go. Peter Schmeichel, Van Basten and Zidane doing the draw soon. Nice touch by Uefa with a small tribute to Gary Speed.
They just showed Torres getting the winning goal from Euro 2008. That form is long gone sadly.
Platini is out so not long to go now
There’s Sergei Bubka. No sign of his pole. We warned you about laughing down the back.
Stars of previous Euros are now being wheeled out. Marco van Basten and Zinedine Zidane are there. No sign of Chris Morris.
Shockingly, Offaly man Barack Obama doesn’t seem to bothered about the draw. Stil dancing in Kiev by the way.
Unsurprisingly one of the hosts, Olga Freimut, is quite easy on the eye. Still no draw details yet. City guides happening now.
Dancing now. In Kiev, not here.
Wesley Sneijder has tweeted that he is watching the draw. Good to know one footballer is watching.
Another former Irish international, Ray Houghton, has just said he doesn’t want us to get England because “there would be such a demand for tickets and you wouldn’t want to see any kind of trouble”.
Mark ‘Lawro’ Lawrenson on the BBC just now:
“From Ireland’s point of view, it would be a great fixture against England, but they would like something easier.” No, we want England Mark.
It all kicks off in two minutes but there will be no ball action until after 5.30. No laughing down the back.
The draw makes today a very good day to be an Irish football fan but the man who voiced all those great days of past Irish success, George Hamilton, has been missing from the recent excitement, recovering from illness.
But like a religious figure of some kind, he reappears on this most important day for Ireland with his first tweet in five months. Welcome back George!
Apparently we will be treated to the P Virksy Ukranian National Folk Dance Ensemble at some stage during the draw. Glad you’re not there now aren’t you?
Fabio Capello has been having his say on the chances of facing us. It’s safe to say he doesn’t fancy facing Trap.
“I spoke with Giovanni Trapattoni and [his assistant] Marco Tardelli after they got through,” Capello said. “They were both really happy. I think it’s a real success for Ireland and for this manager. It is a great thing. I hope we are not [drawn against them]. The countries are close and also it would be two Italian managers, so I’d prefer not to be drawn with them. It would be interesting, but I prefer not. We cannot draw Italy as we are in the same pot but this would be the same for me to face another Italian manager.”
Not long to go now folks, and we are getting increasingy hopeful of a good draw.
However, we are not as hopeful as this guy
We found this tweet and we now have irrational hope of victory in the summer.
Because all the bigwigs of European football are in Kiev for the draw there are lots of bits of news leaking out as thousands of journalists search for stuff to file. One interesting snippet to emerge is that Michel Platini is prepared to allow the 2022 World Cup in Qatar to be played in the winter.
This would mean the event would avoid the scorching weather of the summer but to make it possible all the existing club competitions would have to be moved. No problem says Michel.
“If the people can’t come to enjoy it [because it is too hot], it’s not good. Instead of stopping the [European] season in May, you play until June, then stop in December. Where is the problem?” Think a few clubs might have a problem anyway Michel.
They just held the dummy draw to make sure everything works and guess who got; Poland, Germany and Greece. We would take that in the real thing I think…
1442:
Wonder if Wayne Rooney is bothering to watch the draw later? As it stands he is set to miss the group games, by which time England could be on their way home. He’s probably playing Fifa 12.
Most of the Irish fans on Twitter seem to want England in today’s draw but if we don’t get Fabio’s boys the prospect of a friendly against them at Aviva Stadium becomes a real possibility. Some consolation then anyway.
So the official ball for the Euros has been leaked. Called the Tango 12, makers Adidas claim it won’t have any of the problems that the infamous Jabulani ball caused at the last World Cup. We hope they are right.
Is anyone else fed up of the so-called ‘Group of Debt’ joke if ourselves, Spain, Italy and Greece end up being drawn together? Sure it was funny and clever at first, but soon gets tired when repeated ad nauseum. Or maybe we’re just getting a bit antsy and impatient waiting for the draw to start.
While it’s fair to say we can’t wait for the draw with only hours to go, not everybody is holding their breath. There’s a story in the Guardian today about an attempted protest from topless women’s rights activists who believe that Uefa are trying to legalise prostitution for the duration of the tournament next summer.
Interestingly, the group’s leader goes by the name of Shevchenko, although we’re unsure if she bears any relation to the once great AC Milan striker. It’s a nippy four degrees in Kiev today so we can’t imagine the girls were too comfortable, while the guards would want to be careful for fear of having their eyes taken out.
The whole thing gets under way at around 5.30pm, when there will be lots of back-slapping for all involved (that’ll take 40 minutes) and then the draw itself (20 minutes). So by tea-time we should know who we’re playing next summer – whether it’s a group we can really fancy our chances in, or the Holy Crap Group, or somewhere in between.
You can read more on the possible permutations here, or alternatively you can sit tight, keep this page open and we’ll throw tweets, snippets and newslines your way whenever we get them.
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