A summit of two halves

Date: 27/06/1996

It was the beef and soccer summit, a game of two halves in which the only thing that counted were the balls in the back of the net.

It came as no surprise that UK Prime Minister John Major left the Florence needle match last week declaring victory for England on two fronts.

But it was a close-run thing - a penalty shoot-out decision in Major's favour after a sustained attack by the opposition took the clash into extra time. But as the cheers went up and the victors headed for home, it was by no means certain that the celebrations about the Florence result would be anything but short-lived. And that, as they say, was just the beef.

It was not the first time a summit had been over-run by sport. Few can forget the chutzpah of Denmark's Uffe Ellemann-Jensen, whose country won the European Championship weeks after the Danes had shocked the world, or at least some parts of Europe, by rejecting the Maastricht Treaty in a referendum. It was wretched for Ellemann-Jensen, an outcast at the Lisbon summit.

But all was transformed by the soccer, as the Danes beat the Germans in the final of the European Championships. That night Uffe made an unforgettable entrance into the summit dinner, complete with a supporter's scarf around his shoulders, declaring: “If you can't join them, beat them.”

Then there was the Irish summit during the World Cup a few years ago. Everyone, from the security men at Dublin Castle to the diplomats, were glued to television sets. Only the poor Union leaders were locked in talks, discussing affairs of state.

But then, as the game against Romania went Ireland's way, word was sent into summit host Charles Haughey, the then Irish Prime Minister, who had asked to be kept informed.

The tension was too much. No one was in any mood for negotiation. Haughey ordered a television set to be wheeled in so that the EU's political rulers could concentrate on the real issues affecting the everyday lives of the citizens.