From left Packie Bonner, Jack Charlton and FAI boss Fran Fields, Dublin, July 1, 1990.
Katie writes:
It’s 26 years since Jack Charlton led Ireland on its first and greatest World Cup run, and Packie Bonner was there through it all, the backbone of an Irish team blessed with a degree of talent and purpose that has rarely been matched.
On the eve of Euro 2016 and to mark the paperback release of his long-awaited autobiography The Last Line (shortlisted for the Bord Gáis Energy Sports Book of the Year), Bonner talks to writer and broadcaster Gerry McDade about his life and career, tracing his evolution from shy Donegal teenager to national hero, and reflecting on the World Cup penalty save that changed his life forever.
We have THREE pairs of tickets to catch this night with Packie at the Smock Alley Theatre, Lower Exchange Street, Dublin 8 at 8pm next Thursday to giveaway.
Just complete this sentence:
“My abiding memory of ‘Italia ’90 involved_____________________’
Lines MUST close at midnight
Packie Bonner at The Smock Alley Theatre
The Last Line By Packie Bonner
My abiding memory of Italia 90 involves my mate Bimbo driving our chipper van into the sea.
My abiding memory of ‘Italia ’90 involved wondering why Broadsheet put a picture of Mark E Smith from The Fall in a photo for a silly competition I’m not actually entering. That’s him on Jack’s left.*
*Hey, I couldn’t say he was on the Right, could I? (You think this is easy)
And another thing, probably a little off-topic, but hey….
-I always have a little chuckle to myself when a fly lands in my drink. They don’t know, do they?
-That’s straight whiskey, no mixer. They aren’t going home after this. I give them 8 seconds before they go unconscious and then I pick them out and flick them away.
It’s just like real-life.
You’re on the wrong thread Dopey.
Who are you?
Carry on boys….
He’s off his head…he’s way past being confrontational….he cares not a flip….
You can have your website back.
My abiding memory of ‘Italia ’90 involved dancing on tables in a bar in Donegal! I’m from Kildare – our tables are not so accommodating :)
I know what you’re saying there Slightly Bemused.
I once went outside Dublin for a few minutes.
-It was crazy.
… half an hour passes….nothing happens….
…tumbleweed.gif…
I should apologise, aplogisse, appolojize….
I should just wish the best of luck to the winner.
Involved me getting my lovely Penneys ‘give it a lash Jack’ t-shirt covered in Cavan cola as we , and my other young cousin, bounced around like mad after Packie saved that peno while watching it in my Grannys house.
We were full of sugar and excitement… and it seemed the grown ups dancing around us were too!
Great times
We have a winner…
I mean we have an entrant.
How does it feel Spud1, winning something by accident?
-You don’t have to answer….
@sǝɯǝɯʇɐpɐq
– If somebody else doesn’t ‘compose an entry’* it’s going to look bad.
Think about it…
Packie Bonner never did anything to stop you selling the book you never wrote.
Why do you think it’s okay to take the pi55 out of a book he got someone to write for him?
-Your mind is a bit twisted.
Avatar!!!!!
You keep getting it wrong. I don’t know what to say.
Woah, I was in Cavan too. Spooky… or maybe it’s just the eerie silence in this thread.
Caroline, you’ll have to change your name, please.
-I already love a girl called Caroline. I’m already confused. If this is a trick it isn’t working so stop.
Who’s this other Caroline? She sounds like a total headwrecker. No offence, obviously.
It’s okay, relax…
She’s a real girl. I checked.
-She has all the proper bits and stuff.
I’d never confuse the two of you in real life.
Which is kinda sweet…
In all seriousness, I actually lost me job over that Italia ’90 thing.
It seems funny now, but you should’ve seen how hard it was to get a taxi to Dublin Airport that evening.
-I missed me plane, lost me job, and y’know yerself, it’s all been downhill ever since.
I’d rather not talk about it.
I can fully understand how you lost your job – spoofer.
I just think of the episode of Moone Boy, where the kid is “kidnapped” by Romanians whilst on holiday in Donegal.
Euro ’88 was the one for me.
Packie was magic against England.
We went on to more and better things but that was the start.
anyways
My abiding memory of ‘Italia ’90 involved
Packie Bonner and Dave O’Leary on a steamy June night -settle down there – in the Stadio Luigi Ferraris in Genoa.
I think I cried and I didn’t even cry when me own father was hung for stealing a sheep.
I didn’t cry too, even when your father caught me playing with that sheep.
It was obviously his favourite one too.
But anyway, what’s this competition about?
Can you win something you could sell or is it just stupid?
I didn’t cry too, even when your father caught me playing with that sheep.
It was obviously his favourite one too.
But anyway, what’s this competition about?
Can you win something you could sell or is it just stupid?
Succor is an elusive beast.
Here is a video that explains it butter then icon;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaxB5qRSq1I
My abiding memory of Italia 90 involved…my mum cutting up every old shirt or bit of fabric that she had with even a hint of green, white or orange in it and making it into lengths of home made bunting to drape the front garden. Best dressed house on the street!!
This ticket would be for her….huge fan!
My abiding memory of Italian 90 was getting Packie to sign my shirt when they were training for the holland game. I was 13, he was enormous and I knew right there that something great was going to happen.
If more people don’t enter this competition I’m gonna look bad.
I promise not to slag anybody else from now onwards.
You are ALL winners.
(When was this again, 1990? Eh…okay…)
+ 1966
-1/2
I got a new green rara skirt out of it . That’s all I can remember.
My abiding memory of Italia 90 is Pat Bonner’s mammoth fupp up on Roberto Donadoni’s drive to allow Scillachi to deprive us of a semi final place.
My abiding memory of Italia ’90 leaving home, the weather in Dublin and Da’ double!!!
My abiding memory of Italia 90 was sitting in the armchair in the shoot outs of the second round against Romania. Daniel Timofte had just fucked up and we waited and waited for what seemed like an eternity. David O Leary took the ball and looked really nervous and smashed it home. My father for one of the few times in his life cried as did I (I was 8) and my mother. Even now I still feel the lump in my throat thinking about it. Our neighbour Nora who lived up the road was in her 70’s and she skipped down the road crying . It was like a tsunami of tears. Regardless of not winning tickets or not its a nice memory that I needed on crappy weather day and its just put a smile right back on my face….:)
http://www.google.ie/search?q=picture+of+O%27Connell+street+during+italia+90&tbm=isch&oq=picture+of+O%27Connell+street+during+italia+90&gs_l=mobile-heirloom-serp.12…15273.61715.0.64453.37.32.5.0.0.1.1665.14069.1j5j3j3j3j2j7j1j1.26.0….0…1c.1.34.mobile-heirloom-serp..30.7.3645.VWSPXYQeCvc#mhpiv=1
The one of an empty O’Connell street..
My abiding memory of ‘Italia ’90 involved the buachaillí walking out of the Matric exams early to watch the matches while us girls stayed and got all the As.
WOO HOO!
My abiding memory of ‘Italia ’90 involved a piss-up in a brewery during the Ireland v Romania match. My memory of that evening, however, sadly no longer abides.