The Boston Globe doesn't dedicate full pages to visiting football fans. It did for Scotland.
"You turned train stations into sing-alongs, Fenway into a football ground, and an ordinary June into something we'll be talking about for years," read the letter, published Friday in the 150-year-old daily. That's not a PR stunt — that's a city genuinely moved by a set of supporters who showed up, spent money, and made people smile.
The Tartan Army has a reputation. This trip is reinforcing every good bit of it.
Boston didn't want them to leave
Steve Marino, a driver captain on Boston's famous duck cruise tours, summed up the local mood pretty well. "They've been positive, they've spent a lot of money, they're happy. There's nothing but positives across the board." He also arrived at work one morning to find a traffic cone balanced on the head of a giant dinosaur statue outside the ticket office. "We don't know how it got there," he said. Nobody does. That's the point.
Scott Holt, a creative director from New Hampshire, said the fans had "rejuvenated the city" and there's already talk of bringing the Tartan Army back annually. Sam Kennedy, president of the Boston Red Sox, went further — describing Scotland's supporters as possessing a spirit that "has no equivalent in American sport." That's a serious compliment from a city that bleeds for its sports teams.
Tens of thousands of Scots attended games, explored the city, took in Red Sox baseball, and, by most accounts, drank establishments to the edge of their capacity. The economic injection to Boston was significant — though no one seems to be putting an exact figure on it yet.
Miami is next, and the heat won't slow them down
Fans have already started flooding into Miami ahead of Scotland's clash with Brazil, with temperatures hitting 35°C on Sunday. Billy Taylor, a builder from Edinburgh, called it "too hot — but superb." His travelling companion Alan Taylor has tickets for Uruguay vs Cape Verde before the main event Wednesday. "You can really feel it building," Alan said. "It's going to be great."
William Bannister, a 69-year-old from Cumbernauld, is at his first World Cup away — alongside his son Neal. "I'm 69 years young and I'm taking my oldest boy to our first World Cup away," he said. "It's absolutely stupendous." He also doesn't know who the Miami Marlins are playing tomorrow. He's going anyway.
The Tartan Army have already won something in the United States — and the football hasn't even entered the conversation yet.
