Every day stewardess meets professor, academic, Ishotyan and who are you for her? I remind professor/ Khachikyan’s phrase very often, because none of the stewardess can show me a strong competition in flying hours! I meet Del Bosque , Trapattoni,  Casillas, Fabregas, Buffoun, Casano and other stars every day, but in spite of a strong attempt, did not notice anywhere Armenian football star (70s ) Ashtoyan.. I just joke, a technical forward of “Ararrat” with a long nose has been living in the US for a long time and he appears on TV very often, he was consulting sport-journalists..
Yesterday while waiting for Ishtoyan at Warsaw air-port suddenly Fernando Morientes appared- he was leaving for Gdansk with us- he is consulting Spanish TV company and he is the host of the program which broadcast live matches of Spain. We talked a little about football, mentioned several starts, took memorable photos and stewardesses appeared- time to take off..
In Gdansk, a day before the match looking at Geovanni Trapattoni at the press-conference was really interesting and pleasant- this brilliant coach won almost everything, he is distinguished with his intellect and a strong character: twelve years ago when Trapattoni was appointed as head coach of “Bayern” Munich, after several match whole world saw his unforgettable press-conference, from “Bayern” base Italian almost destroy the whole press-conference hall and criticized the players very much! That year “Bayern” could not win silver medal and Trapattoni went back to Italy, but soon he learnt German, returned Germany and brought championship to “Bayern” next year!!! 

Trapattoni is connected to Georgian national team too. In 1999 when I was in Ankona, when Georgian played very well and when they lost only due to created penalties, then Tramp was telling me convincingly that both of these penalties were real… everyone is expected to remember what happened to Italy in South Korea-Japan next year. The same happened several years ago- at the end of the match between Ireland-Georgia, everyone is expected to remember penalty kick. Football fortune reminded it to Trapattoni and Ireland and everyone remembers well how many times was written about Tierry Henry’s handball… 

In spite of fiasco, Trapattoni learnt English too and took Ireland through European championship. Now, it was really pleasant to hear his response, besides professionalism Italian coach has a good sense of humor…
Spanish team kept the tradition and as usual presented itself with three starts at the press-conference, this time with Xabi Alonso, Jordi Alba and Cesc Fabregas! When Spanish player finished answering questions, I went out the room, Del Bosque was watching the match between Portugal-Denmark, 15 minutes were left and you also saw how players started to play when the score was 2:2, Del Bosque had to meet journalists and he left but I continued watching football with Spanish players. There would not be held training and that’s why electricity went off, Xabi Alonso did not confused, he switched his mobile, found necessary TV channel and invited Jorbi, Fabregas and me. So we watched the match till the end in his mobile.. 

I will not say anything about the match- who did not watch it, lost a lot of thing and those who watched it, do not need me to tell anything!!! I have seen football performance a lot of times but I will never forget this match, Spain showed as one more time what is football. As for Trapattoni, he surprised us with his professionalism and politeness- we expected him after such failure would not make any comment and after the match I asked him to give interview only to Irish TV channel, but to my surprise he gave interviews in details all the five channels and then went to the press-conference.. Irish players also gave interviews and in total I set my record- Irish side gave 21 interviews…

Mamuka Kvarsatskhelia UEFA media officer, special for “World Sport” from Warsaw

Photos by Author