Massachusetts bar owners might have seen it coming. The Irish tradition, the near-sacred weight of a St Patrick’s Day drink, another Celtic wave arriving for a World Cup match — it should have required planning, deep reserves.
It didn’t.
One game, one Scottish victory, and Boston’s pubs were already scraping the bottom of the barrel.
“We’ve been here thirty years and we’ve never seen anything like it,” staff told The Boston Globe, eyes still wide. “We tripled St Patrick’s numbers. These fans brought back a sense of fun we’d lost.”
Perhaps running dry was part of the deal.
The scene takes on strange contours. Bartenders slightly stunned — “at some point we just started ordering everything, because they really drink anything” — and the Tartan Army moving through the city in full voice.
Around 60,000 inside the stadium alone, where Scotland had not played a World Cup match in 28 years, and not won one in 36.
They had already made headlines for their singing. Now another register entirely, from vocal cords to something closer to endurance.
Still, everything unfolds in an unexpectedly easy atmosphere. Little of the excess you might imagine. The culture of Scottish supporters plays its part — nothing beyond their usual matchday routine — spilling into the surrounding streets.
Kilts arriving from the Highlands. Locals drawn into it. Hard to count the numbers around Boston’s bars. Enough, at least, to empty them by nightfall.
Next Tuesday, again in Massachusetts, it is Ghana–England. The pubs will be ready for the main event.
Bellingham and company arrive charged, inside and outside the stadium. If the match on the pitch risks imbalance, the same may be true beyond it.
Scotland, in the meantime, have already shown the template: drink, noise, drink again, and somehow keep the streets intact.
Not an easy balance.
After the decisive goal against Haiti, McGinn and the others move on to Morocco and Brazil. Their supporters, meanwhile, are already accounted for.