LIVING near Croke Park has its perks and its drawbacks. Last Sunday, as the Pittsburgh Steelers took on the Minnesota Vikings, I had the telly on inside and the back door open outside, hoping some of the atmosphere would drift down the back streets of Marino. At €250 a ticket, it was as close as I was getting. You could hear the roars roll out of the stadium, a surreal soundscape of American voices bouncing around a Dublin neighbourhood better known for hurling finals and, recently, the Gallagher Brothers and 10,000 weeping Irish men.

The government stumped up €10m to bring the helmet and shoulder pad spectacle to town, including a five million dollar license to the NFL – a hefty investment meant to showcase Ireland on the global stage. And for the most part, it worked. Croke Park was electric, the game was decent, and international coverage highlighted Dublin’s ability to host major sporting events. Unfortunately, one off-field story threatened to overshadow it all. Steelers reserve quarterback Skylar Thompson was mugged in Temple Bar the Friday night before kickoff. Only in this city could a man trained to evade hulking linebackers find himself stripped of his possessions by a skinny lad in a tracksuit. It would be funny if it weren’t so depressing. Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan was quick to point out that no report of an assault on an NFL player in Dublin had been made to gardaí but the damage was done, it seems.

A colleague in LA texted to say he was up early with his family to watch the game, pointing out how great Croke Park looked and how the weather had held. Depressingly, he reported that the ticker tape under the game had references to the mugging throughout. So the blarney and the endless Guinness references were somewhat undermined by one opportunistic gobsh***.

In better news, it’s likely that all the endless virals of Bill Murray singing songs with the locals in Dingle will do something to redress the balance. In tricky situations like this, who ya gonna call?

Debate lost to Guinness

DID ye catch the first Presidential debate on Monday night? I know it’s my job to look at such things on your behalf, but I’ll be completely honest here and say we had moved to The House of Guinness on Netflix within a couple of questions. I caught up subsequently, and have to say that it was so boring as to be completely refreshing. In an age of Trump and fears for the end of democracy, this had the comforting mediocrity of a town hall meeting to debate flower planting options on the local ring road.

There was no obvious winner, but it was a tough night for Jim Gavin. He’s clearly been made to go to some sort of media training school which teaches politicians to jab their thumbs forward earnestly to make a point. I’m shocked people think this sort of rehearsed body language still works – I find it utterly offputting. Heather Humphries wasn’t much better. Indeed, it was a bit of a case of TweedleThumb and TweedleAuntie. She stumbled a bit through answers and failed to mark out what would make her distinct as President. Wearing a colourful scarf throughout that gave her the air of your auntie popping in for a quick visit on the way home from mass but still sitting there three hours later droning on about who else is dead.

Catherine Connolly will be the happiest after Monday evening, giving a robust performance that most closely echoed Michael D’s presidency. With the left united behind her, it will be extremely interesting to see how the public votes. Gavin and Humphries might cancel each other out and, as I’ve said in this column before, we Irish love nothing more than signalling left in our voting when there are no actual follow-throughs – like paying more tax or funding public services properly.

It all makes a nice refresher from the Headbangers Ball editions of presidential debates we’ve had in recent years.

Here’s to the boring middle (ish) ground!

Shane’s living life of Lowry

I REALLY don’t get why the Ryder Cup has turned into some sort of thuggish slagging match. I’ve enjoyed golf on TV on a few occasions in the past, but I generally don’t have time for it. And there is something ever so slightly obscene about fencing off whole areas of our natural world and razing its wildlife so a bunch of middle managers can carve out some time away from their wives.

I’m more of a pitch n’putt man myself—you get around quicker, the green fees are cheap, and you can drink a few cans while you’re doing it.

But I don’t understand how American golf fans have turned into the equivalent of Millwall supporters.

I thought golf fans were relatively well-heeled and civilised types, more likely to enjoy a quiet sherry in the clubhouse and discuss their cholesterol results.

Instead, you have rabid idiots calling Rory McIlroy an ‘overrated leprechaun’ and throwing beer on his wife. It seems to be the ultimate representation of the sort of morons running the country over there at the moment – lots of angry halfwits with misplaced superiority complexes.

It was brilliant we handed them their arse. Good man yourself, Shane Lowry. You don’t mess with the Offaly crowd.