And as Scotland basks in World Cup glory let’s include our Celtic cousins too and the Irish bar flagging up Ivorian Green, white and gold.
Now we’ve been here ourselves, and too often, with the world champions in waiting (that’s us) outside looking in for 28 years.
And in that decade and a half trying to immerse ourselves in the tourney through clever tie-ins.
Like adopting whichever team is playing England with some smart word play in the marketing merch.
Although worryingly one in ten Scots want England to do well, including Royalist Roy next door.
The Green, White and Verde
It is the birthright, of course, of all Celts that you get to support Ireland or Wales too if your own country miss out.
And in Ireland’s case anybody with any tangental connection.
Such as Cape Verde’s Roberto “Pico” Lopes, a Shamrock Rovers defender the Africans tapped up on LinkedIn.
After discovering he qualified through his father.
Now Ireland and the diaspora have lent their support to Cape Verde.
With the Honey Fitz bar in Astoria, New York adopting the archipelago as their team for the tourney.
And we dare say that the old family bar, the iconic Irish Cottage, in Queens too would have done the same was it still here now.
Men in the mirror
For us living in the country of the world champion heir apparents there is another Irish link, for when Scotland aren’t playing.
In the shape of Cote D’Ivoire, or the Ivory Coast, because their flag is the mirror image of Ireland’s.
Ireland’s green, white and orange represented green Irish catholicism, orange Northern protestantism and white for peace.
And the Cote D’Ivoire’s green for its grasslands, orange for its forests and white, er, for peace again.
Edinburgh and Ivory
Biddy Mulligan’s in Edinburgh’s Grassmarket has gone full Ivorian.
With all Irish flags, which feature the same tricolour as the Ivory Coast in a different order, will be flipped to represent the African nation.
While Ivory Coast tunes will be played before and after matches.
And Biddy’s has also partnered with an Ivory Coast snacks company to bring food to customers ‘straight from the source’.
And have even bought in hundreds of bottle of African Guinness. with the stout selling more in Africa than any other continent.
