Scotland's Boston love affair one for the ages

But the love affair here has gone way beyond baseball, this has been a glorious embracing of two cultures. A point underlined by the news Boston Mayor Michelle Wu has declared a sister city application with Glasgow. Fittingly, she did so in a Scottish pub wearing a Scotland football jersey. Tens of thousands of football fans swarming to a city for a major tournament is nothing new, but it is the manner of the revelry here that has set it apart. At the time of writing, there has not been one arrest of a Scotland fan either in Boston or Providence, another nearby stronghold of the Tartan Army. The ground work for this Boston bash was laid two years ago in Bavaria. At the last European Championships, Marienplatz felt like it held more Scots within it than Motherwell. Again, Scotland fans were lauded for their behaviour, generosity and patter. Alas, the football did its best to ruin the party. That is perhaps one key difference to this shindig, apart from the obvious step up in excitement from a Euros to their first World Cup in 28 years. What mood the Tartan Army would have been in if the opener against Haiti had turned into a disaster we will never know. Although, I would say it would not have made a dent. The team on the pitch have done their bit to keep the party in full swing and a point against Morocco on Friday could trigger a tidal wave of celebration flooding back into Boston that night the likes they have never seen. …