L'utlimo grande portiere bandiera del calcio di una volta. con il rispetto dovuto a ronnie simpson, vincitore della coppa campioni nel 67, Bonner per me rimane l'unico grande portiere che abbiamo avuto. l'ho visto giocare da vicino e se devo spendere un aggettivo direi "sempre esigente verso sè stesso".
incollo alcune notizie trovate nel web, dove potrete trovare foto e (penso) anche qualche immagine. sottolineo che anch'io ricordo qualche papera, ma rimane il mio numero 1.
Patrick "Packie" Bonner
IT IS NOT very well documented just quite how well-known Luciano Pavarotti was in Ireland before 1990, but the chances are knowledge of his existence was confined to a niche audience.
There was no denying the larger-than-life Italian tenor's obvious talents, but his operatic overtones were never likely to make him a household name in pre-Celtic Tiger Ireland. Things changed, however, and although he would have been blissfully unaware beforehand, it was these very same operatic overtones that were to provide the soundtrack for that particular summer across the water. High-brow and popular culture met halfway and Pat Bonner was there to play his part.
On a sweltering afternoon in Genoa, 20 years ago this week, "Packie", as he's known in Ireland, was on the biggest stage of his life. He'd tasted success before – five Scottish League titles with Celtic and an English scalp at Euro 88. Great achievements, but a place in the last eight of football's greatest showpiece? That was an entirely different kind of success.
Locked at 0-0 and facing penalties after 120 minutes of blood, sweat and tears in the uncharted territories of the World Cup second round against a Romanian side boasting a certain Gheorghe Hagi in their ranks, Bonner and his Republic of Ireland team-mates were in the process of taking their nation on its greatest-ever sporting odyssey. Sure, there'd been the odd Olympic success, rugby Triple Crown and famous All-Ireland Sunday at Croke Park to beam about before, but none could claim the collectively unifying effect of this.
Bonner stood 12 feet from Daniel Tiomfte. He'd conceded four penalties but his compatriots had scored four in reply, and having dived the right way each time, Bonner stood on brink of writing his own piece of Irish history. The Donegal man was high on confidence. He'd surprised himself. Penalties were hardly his forte up to that point.
"I had gone before that into a Scottish Cup final and went the right way for one of nine penalties against Aberdeen so when I came back I sat with (Ireland's substitute goalkeeper] Gerry Peyton and we talked about it. Gerry was older than me, he was more experienced and we came up with a bit of a formula on how somebody would run up to the ball and where they were going to hit the penalties. The first penalty I went the right way. Second and third penalty? The right way. I just made contact on the fourth but they were all good, good penalties."
In the pressure-cooker environment that is World Cup football, where the stakes range from high to out of sight, someone's always going to crack. On that particular afternoon it was Timofte. Bonner sized up his opponent and knew the duel was the Romanian's to lose: "When Daniel Timofte stepped up, he walked up very, very slowly and he didn't look confident. I was high on confidence because I'd been going the right way and the last penalty had just grazed my fingertips.
"His penalty wasn't a great penalty if you look at it. He stood at an acute angle so I had my mind made up where I was going because that was the formula we had worked out in our heads. It was about a metre off the ground and didn't have fantastic pace like the others.
"Everything was going for it. If it was the first penalty or second penalty you'd still have another three or four to go and there was a great chance the pressure might build and we might miss one ourselves, so it was the perfect one to save. It wasn't a perfect penalty but it was the one if you were going to save it."
Job done, Bonner returned to the centre circle as David O'Leary stepped up to catapult the Republic into the big time. A nation, as RTÉ commentator George Hamilton declared, held its breath. O'Leary made no mistake and as Ireland manager Jack Charlton smiled contentedly to himself and the masses clad in green entered delirium, Pavarotti's stirring rendition of Nessun Dorma became as much an Irish anthem that summer as the one concerning those low-lying fields in Athenry.
"The funny thing about it," Bonner says, "is that people keep talking about it as if it was yesterday. I suppose because people remember it so fondly and it sort of lives in their memory as a very joyous time. It was new to us in this country and everybody seemed to be a part of it and it wasn't confined just to football people. It captured the imagination of every single person in the country whether they were young, old, man, boy, woman, girl, Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, wherever you came from or whether you played Gaelic (GAA], rugby or any other sport."
While the Republic's exit in the quarter-finals at the hands of the host nation and their prolific man of the hour, Toto Schillaci, was a disappointment, it did little to diminish the hero status bestowed on Bonner and his team-mates back home. Twenty years on and the current Irish crop are licking their wounds, having failed to reach South Africa after Thierry Henry introduced Gaelic football to the French public. Bonner however, now technical director of the Football Association of Ireland, has no time for focusing on the negative.
"I think it took the world by surprise how well we played but, against France, I always felt deep down that we might achieve something. The handball thing? It happened. If it was one of our guys would we be saying the same? These things happen in professional sport. You can look at it from a negative point of view but I'd rather look at from a point of being positive, how well we played and the great hope it gives us for the future."
Thierry Henry's handball denies Ireland the chance to reach South Africa. 'These things happen', says Bonner.
Hope for the future indeed: it is also a future in which the FAI hopes Glasgow-born Aiden McGeady will feature prominently. Bonner is better placed than most to comment on McGeady's international allegiance, many of his international colleagues being Irish by descent as opposed to birth. But more importantly, he hails from Donegal and understands the patriotic link the Irish community in Scotland has with Ireland's north-west. "Aiden committed himself to Ireland when he was 14 years old," said Bonner. "He always wanted to play for Ireland because of his roots and he used to go over and back, every summer.
"So all of that cultural background was there with Aiden and there are loads of people there that have got that cultural tie with Ireland and given the opportunity to play for what they regard as their country, they'll always take it. Where Scotland missed out is that they probably should have had Aiden in a bit quicker so they can't now turn around and condemn Aiden for the opportunity that he took and that he always wanted to do. The rules are there, that's why the rules are there."
Bonner is not only held in high esteem in his native land, almost two decades in the blood-and-thunder world of Old Firm football have earned him the respect of the Scottish footballing community for generations to come, especially at Celtic Park, where he kept goal for so long. And his debt to Scotland is not lost on him: "I've been in Scotland now over 30 years, I played with Celtic for 19 years and through that process I got to play for my country. I'm grateful to Scotland and Celtic for allowing me to come over and ply my trade. I would like to think I gave something back to the fans."
Pavarotti may have passed on but his anthem remains. The way Italia 90 still lives in the hearts and minds of football fans, it would be no surprise to see us back here again in another 20 years discussing the 40th anniversary of Bonner versus Timofte.
Throughout the world, there are footballers destined to be forever remembered for one solitary moment.
For the unlucky ones, that can mean an otherwise glittering career being completely overshadowed by an embarrassing own-goal or a costly penalty miss. Fortunately for Pat Bonner, he belongs to another, more auspicious breed. That is because, for the rest of his days and doubtless beyond, the name of this beloved Irish goalkeeper will always be synonymous with one very special save.
It was by no means his best: he had made and would go on to make many better in a career that spanned 80 caps and 642 appearances for Celtic, his one and only club. Yet none were more significant, nor more fondly remembered, than the diving lunge that blocked a penalty from Romania's Daniel Timofte and sent Republic of Ireland into the quarter-finals at Italy 1990. To this day, in fact, many consider it to be the nation's 'JFK moment', with every Irishman able to tell you where he was when 'Packie' took his place in history.
It really wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that that one save changed my life forever, certainly in terms of recognition.
Former Republic of Ireland goalkeeper Pat Bonner on stopping a penalty from Romania's Daniel Timofte at Italy 1990
"It still amazes me, the impact that save has had," Bonner told FIFA.com. "Every day, I have people coming up to me to talk about it and thank me. It really wouldn't be an exaggeration to say that that one save changed my life forever, certainly in terms of recognition. It's lovely, although sometimes you do feel like saying, 'I did make some other saves, you know!'
"But I do feel very fortunate because one thing that whole World Cup experience achieved, which was unique and very special, was to bring everyone in the country together. Our economy was very weak at the time, there was a bit of pessimism there, and I really believe that seeing us out there in Italy, taking on the world, fighting our corner against the very best, changed the mindset of the nation. Football can be that important, I genuinely believe that."
When Jack Charlton's team returned from Italy, an estimated 500,000 people packed the streets of Dublin to let the players know just how important their efforts had been in scenes that Bonner, for one, will never forget. The football world had witnessed the birth of Republic of Ireland as a force to reckoned with and, four years later, the boys in green were back on the global stage. Yet what they found in the USA was a very different kind of FIFA World Cup.
As Bonner explained: "It was a real culture shock to go from Italy, which is a real football country, to the US, where it was obvious that most people didn't even know the World Cup was on! The tournament just didn't have the same atmosphere around it and the climate in Florida certainly didn't help us. That said, I'll always remember the game against Italy in New York, not so much for the fact we beat them, but for the way the Irish fans completely took over that stadium. If we'd been in that part of the country for the whole competition, I think we'd have enjoyed it a lot more."
Today
Bonner's 15-year reign as his country's No1 came to an end in 1996, and following stints on the backroom staff at Celtic and Reading, it was no surprise when he returned the Republic of Ireland set-up as goalkeeping coach under Mick McCarthy. These days, however, the Football Association of Ireland employ the 49-year-old in a more demanding day-to-day role, heading up its biggest and most important department as technical director.
"It's a massive job and it has grown dramatically since I've taken it on," Bonner said. "Our clubs don't have professional academies like they do across the water in England and Scotland, so we have to do it ourselves in terms of developing our own players. That's required a major plan from grassroots up to the senior side.
I'm delighted to be contributing and hopefully I can play my part in a very successful future for Irish football.
Pat Bonner on his current role as the Football Association of Ireland's technical director
"I have 110 staff working with me in the department and we brought in a performance director, (former Netherlands international) Wim Koevermans, who I now work very closely with to make sure we make the best of the resources we have. There's certainly no respite, and it's very different to anything I ever dealt with during my playing career. But I'm delighted to be contributing and hopefully I can play my part in a very successful future for Irish football."
Edited by McGiro - 21/11/2011, 18:09
