Calm after a storming success for fans and the English players

England fans were in a party mood, not a smashing-things-up mood. The streets swarmed with pairs of shorts and white trainers containing England supporters of all shapes and sizes but a uniform good temper.

Only the extremely obvious British police spotters stood out from the crowd. The Portuguese riot squads maintaining a low-visibility policy, were out of sight.

Inland Coimbra lived up to its reputation as the hottest city in Portugal. That means lots of drinking. It is small with only a couple of squares for the supporters to fill up.

As kick-off approached, and the jammed plaza outside Estadio Municipal emptied of red and white shirts, the locals came gingerly back out to reclaim their cafes and streets, like Bosnian Muslims during some brief Sarajevo ceasefire. "They seem very nice," said one man with a faint air of surprise.

A few stragglers, unable to get tickets, looked around desperately for a TV showing the match. In a typical gesture of Portuguese goodwill, a shop opened its doors and switched channels to the one with the English commentary.

As each goal-scoring roar from the stadium echoed , the Portuguese cafe patrons gave small shudders of relief. The English were winning. There was not going to be a riot. But ten minutes before the final whistle they started clearing the tables and chairs, just in case. And the old folk went back inside.

They need not have bothered. The English fans have something to lose now. Soon the squares of the old city were filled with celebrating crowds, English and Swiss together in their team strips.

In Praca da Republica, on a little square of Astroturf complete with goals, the two nations' fans were trying for a re-match.

The only disconcolate figures were packs of journalists trudging the streets in search of non-existent trouble.

Earlier I sat on a crowded football special train where a gang of English fans were occupying seats reserved by a group of Switzerland fans.

The English lads had all the worst danger signs: buttoned-down shirts, baseball caps, Reebok Classic trainers, eyes and earrings glinting. They had been drinking; there were no police in sight.

This, we thought, would be where it started. But with polite apologies, every single England supporters got up and gave way to the Swiss.

You still have to worry about what comes next. England vs Croatia, an all-important game between two wartime enemies, marked-down as 1945 on the fixture list. That, of course, is only the kick-off time.

But just as the England football team can throw it unexpectedly away, so too can the team playing England vs Yobs.

There were virtually no arrests in Coimbra last night. It is 6am as I write this and they are still partying.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in