It was too much to expect, I guess, to have two good matches on two consecutive nights. This doesn’t look like soccer to me, there is no elegance, no genius, but a lot of really hard body work, very hard tackles. And no scores. In 90 minutes!

Pádraig had his total of six hours on the speech valve and he managing that superbly. Who would have thought this just a month or two ago! And today, he did much better than that: today, he had eight or nine spoon full of chocolate pudding.

And, as it is terribly hot in Hamburg, the plan is to continue with ice-cream tomorrow. There won’t be a choice of flavours, they’ll be pre-determined to stay in the whole frame-of-mind of winning:)

Can you imagine that: from nothing for a year, to semolina, followed by chocolate pudding, and then ice-cream – all within just about a week! I know, eating a pudding or even an ice-cream… what’s the big deal? But – if you haven’t eaten a thing, nothing at all at all at all, for more than a year, to be able to get all these sensation into your mouth must be tremendous.

Went out into the back garden this afternoon, back in Dublin. The hammocks are still hanging there, and Pádraig was ‘hanging out’ there, planning his next adventure, chilling. His favourite place in the garden. He was there, because without him none of this makes any sense. Whatsoever.

Off to Limerick in the morning, meeting with the NAI later on to plan An Saol.