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Sam Adams is the beer of Boston, named after the fourth governor of Massachusetts and founding father of the United States. Downtown, there’s a tap room where you can drink it all day. On Thursday lunchtime the bar was packed, full of Scotland fans, and hanging over the first floor balcony was a big yellow flag. It bore the legend “Remember Bannockburn 1315”.
Of all the bases the Tartan Army could have found for their World Cup journey, it had to be the city renowned for chasing the English out of town. Supporters dressed like William Wallace have been bonding with tour guides dressed like Paul Revere. Others have been walking around wearing “Boston T Party” T-shirts, where the T stands for Tennent’s. Meanwhile, next to the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill, the Scottish Football Association has rebranded a local pub as Scotland House, and even had it sponsored by M&S Food.
The 2,000-person venue is expected to be at capacity on Saturday night, full of fans who have travelled to the US but don’t have a ticket for the game with Haiti and are in the market for complimentary Percy Pigs. But most bars in the city are already full of punters, with many giving interviews to local TV. With flights from Scotland crammed all week, estimates suggest as many as 40,000 Scots could be heading to New England for the World Cup.
“There are very few things in life left that you can genuinely describe as once-in-a-lifetime opportunities, but getting to see Scotland at a World Cup is one of them,” says Gordon Sheach. “I’m old enough to remember 1998. I was nine years old and actually it was what made me a Scotland fan. I watched the tournament and I thought: ‘I can’t wait till the next one.’ I didn’t think it would take the entirety of my teenage years, my 20s, and almost my 30s to come back. So now that it’s here, we’re fully committed to having the absolute time of our lives.”
Sheach runs the Tartan Scarf account on social media, a place that, over the past few years, has become an ever-expanding archive of clips and commentary on Scotland’s return from the international wilderness. First Euro 2020, then Germany two years ago and now this, a first World Cup in 28 years, and a tournament where expectations look to change. “As much as being part of the Tartan Army is about having a great time – you travel, you drink, you have a wonderful experience – I’d still quite like us to be successful on the pitch as well,” Sheach says. “And I think for this team under Steve Clarke, that’s what they deserve. The last two Euros, where we’ve been great in qualifying, we haven’t done ourselves justice at the tournament. Now is the time to do that.”
Alan Risk is another travelling fan and part of the Hampden Roar podcast. He regards Scotland’s story under Clarke as one of growing resilience and the creation of a team supporters can identify with. “What we’ve got is a squad that has rebounded numerous times from disappointment,” he says. “As a fanbase, we’ve done the exact same thing.” Equally, the stories of the players who have become national heroes, from Andy Robertson to Scott McTominay, have been told in defiance of hard starts and setbacks. “There are so many players you can feel attached to. At one end you’ve got the bold personality of John McGinn but at the other there’s Aaron Hickey, someone who has had his setbacks but subtly gone about his work. I think quieter fans identify with his subtle professionalism.”
From being knocked out of the World Cup without losing a match in 1974, to the infamous campaign of 78, a solitary point from Uruguay in 86, defeat by Costa Rica in 1990 and a drubbing by Morocco eight years later, Scotland’s World Cup record is full of examples of the folly of daring to dream. But Sheach and Risk are focused on looking forward and convinced that victory will be secured on Saturday night. “I think Haiti will come out of the traps very fast,” says Risk. “They’ve got a lot of speed and I think they’ll have to start the game rapid. But I think if we can get control of it fairly quickly, we can take control of the game.”
The venue for this Group C encounter is the Fifa-renamed Boston Stadium, actually 22 miles from the city in the town of Foxborough. The journey to the ground is poised to be a second odyssey of the week, with reports of phalanxes of school buses being secured to drive Scotland fans to the game. Sheach and Risk will be on the first train, stumping up the $80 (£60) return fare, arriving about three hours before kick-off in the hope of meeting Haiti fans. “This is just as big a moment for them as it is for us, if not more so,” says Sheach. “It’s their first World Cup game in more than 50 years. So I think it’s a very special thing. It’s just one of those unique moments the World Cup can throw up.”
