Super Bowl fever is suddenly sexy all over Ireland again

Tom Brady, Giants and Patriots clash is eagerly awaited

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The new hot question on many Irish sporting lips this weekend is a simple one – are you watching the SuperBowl?

Photo by ESPN

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The question has suddenly become relevant again. People want to know the answer.

A Liverpool fan demanded a response on Tuesday night as he celebrated a Darron Gibson goal for Everton against Manchester City, quite a feat in itself.

A man at a rugby press conference – a journalist as it happened – just had to tell me his answer.

Even at the Golf Writers dinner on Thursday night, a lovely girl from Solheim Cup hosts Killeen Castle wanted to know.

The new hot question on many Irish sporting lips this weekend is a simple one – are you watching the Super Bowl?

I am – but just to prove my unease with this subject I don’t know whether to call it the SuperBowl or the Super Bowl. Is it one word or two?

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Is there a sponsor’s name to go in front of the title, like the Budweiser Derby or the Barclay’s Premier League?

Are we supposed to genuflect in reverence every time we type the word SuperBowl or the words Super Bowl?

There was a time when the Super Bowl featured large on the horizon for every Irish sports journalists worth his or her salted peanuts.

That phenomenon started somewhere in the late 80s as I remember it – and had more to do with the refrigerator in the old Chicago Pizza Pie outlet at the top of Grafton Street than the footballer known as the Refrigerator.

There was a time you see when Budweiser used to throw the mother of all parties in Dublin as quarter-backs were throwing the mother of all passes in Texas or California or wherever the big game was beamed from.

The beer was free, the chicken wings were tasty and life was good. Until 3.30am that is when the bar would close, the bouncers would do their job and we’d all be out on the street.

Those still interested in the match would scramble into the nearest taxi and head for a house with a television screen.

The rest of us would search for a late night den of liquidity and wait to hear the result when we awoke the following morning – or afternoon!

Like all the good times in Ireland, the SuperBowl – or Super Bowl – party came to a halt. The Chicago Pizza Pie closed, Budweiser altered their marketing budget and the Bowl (it’s easier to call it this from now on) became a distant event in a distant land.

Things did begin to change a few years ago mind, thanks to the man by the name of Rupert Murdoch who has transformed our sports options on televisions beyond all recognition.

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