It is not only the pitch in Salzburg which has an artificial feel to it. Normally when away on European trips, I like to pick up a souvenir tee-shirt from whatever club a League of Ireland team are playing against but I don’t really feel like wearing something belonging to a club for whom its badge and the corporate logo of the company which owns it are virtually interchangeable.
Don’t get me wrong, the people in the city in general and the club in particular are very welcoming. For a journalist walking into a stadium where you are seated just a few rows from the pitch with a worktop, a socket and free wifi is manna from heaven and nothing seems to be too much trouble but when the murals on the walls inside the stadium all feature kids sporting something to do with Red Bull in some shape or form it is a little offputting.
For all their faults, UEFA refuse to recognise the club’s current manifestation. Check their website and you will see that Bohemian FC are playing FC Salzburg on Wednesday night. While the drinks manufacturer has done its best to erase the club’s past and subsume it into its multi-national corporation, UEFA has insisted that at least some of its identity is retained.
Off the pitch, the Champions League tie is a complete mismatch. Salzburg’s budget is thought to be €60m per year – Bohs will spend just 2 per cent of that on players’ wages this season. Yet, despite that, it is Bohs which is the club in financial difficulty and it is no secret that they face falling foul of the Salary Cost Protocol and – even if they win the title for a second successive year – being relegated unless they advance thus bringing in much-needed revenue. Yet it says something about how much the two clubs mean when you consider that the 400 Bohs fans expected to be at the game will dwarf the numbers Salzburg bring to Dublin. In fairness, that would go for any League of Ireland club. I’m not sure such figures are available but if you were to compare across the continent average home crowds with the numbers who travel away for European games, I’m pretty sure Ireland would be top of the pile.
Quite apart from the very real sense that this game will mean more to the Bohs players than their Salzburg counterparts (because their very livelihoods depend on it), it would definitely have more significance for the followers of what is, after all, a members’ club. Bohs might be poor but they’ll be happy if they are still in this tie after the first 90 minutes.
Still, there is no getting away from the gulf in class on the pitch and Bohs’ commitment may not be able to quite bridge that so I’m going to put €10 each on Salzburg to win 2-1 at 8/1 and 3-2 at 33/1. In the Europa League on Thursday, both St Pat’s and Derry City have somewhat less daunting challenges. I’m going to put €10 at 7/2 on a draw half-time and a St Pat’s win full-time against Valletta and Derry look too generously priced to beat Skonto Riga at 10/3 so €10 on that. Finally, I’m going to put €10 on an accumulator for home wins for FH Hafnarfjordur, Wisla Krakow, Maccabi Haifa and a draw between WIT Georgia and Maribor in the Champions League for a potential return of €72.82
