EAMONN TIERNEY,
Sir, - Tom Humphries's fine article on The Ryder Cup (LockerRoom, September 30th) was a breath of fresh air. It is indeed hard to become euphoric about Europe's success over the US.
I was genuinely pleased for Paul McGinley, but representing Europe - what does that entail?
Is it the EU? Does it include the Ukraine? Is it the Europe that the Irish people rejected in the Nice Treaty? I wonder what the citizens of Warsaw and Budapest thought about "Europe's" success. - Yours, etc.,
EAMONN TIERNEY, Beverly Avenue, Dublin 16.
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A chara, - Why is it that successful Irish sports people (and those of other nationalities also, I admit), can no longer bask in a victory without being smothered in the national flag by some misguided acolyte or other? The flag is then used or abused variously as a scarf, towel, wrap-around shawl or bunting, as if to dispel any possible doubt that the victor is indeed Irish.
This almost Pavlovian behaviour of the past decade or so is, at best, clichéd and jingoistic, and at worst a serious disrespect to the national symbol. I thought it particularly lamentable that the flag should end up at the bottom of a murky English midlands pond during the Ryder Cup celebrations, though, to his credit, Paul Mc Ginley did retrieve it after his dunking. - Is mise,
TED NEVILLE, Douglas, Co Cork.