Shane Long’s second half goal gave the Republic of Ireland a winning send off from the Aviva Stadium on Saturday.  The side has now left for a training camp in Italy as it completes final preparations for the Euro 2012 Championships.
Ireland are the third team to have qualified for a Euro Championship Finals after a gap of 24 years since their last appearance.  Those who believe in omens will take pleasure in the fact that the two previous teams who did this, France and Denmark, both won their comeback Finals. 
Principal sponsor Three will doubtless highlight this ‘lucky’ number.  They appeared prominently on team bags as the squad prepared to board the privately chartered flight to Italy on Sunday morning.
The Polish City of Gdansk had half page advertisements in many weekend newspapers advertising the delights of the location to travelling fans, and providing another economic boost from the tournament for Irish media.
The popular RTE show Reeling in the Years featured 1982 in a Sunday evening repeat.  This was the year of Northern Ireland’s famous World Cup Finals win over Spain.
It was also the year of Irish assistant manager Marco Tardelli’s  oft shown goal celebration.  Despite being all of 30 years ago the advertising boards behind the goal into which he scored were largely familiar with Gillette, Seiko and Canon prominent alongside one historic curiosity, a board advertising Winston cigarettes.