It was, perhaps, the final indignity for one of the world’s greatest footballers, adding insult, on several levels, to sore knee.
As the Portuguese captain went down, unable to continue after heroically trying to play through the pain barrier having being hacked down earlier in the game, Ronaldo’s Moth, which in terms of people and pets was yesterday even giving Pavlov’s dog a run for his money, alighted on a manicured eyelash to sup the salt of his tears.
At that moment, 25 minutes into the denouement of Euro 16 between France and Portugal, as the stretcher-bearers bore down on him with all manner of life-saving equipment, a few joyriding moths of their own, and crucially, a knee-support and some arnica cream, an irritating bug may have been the least of the great man’s worries as his career flashed in front of his eyes (along with the insect’s proboscis).
But by half-time 50 Twitter accounts had been opened in the bug’s name and, no matter that Portugal would have to play on without their captain, he was no longer the most talked about thing on, or to be more accurate, off the pitch.
Can't believe I was on TV today! What a day. #Euro2016Final#Moth
Some suggested they had come from Arsène Wenger’s wallet and one said Ronaldo was so famous that Mother Nature had sent moths to dry his tears. Holland and Barrett tweeted that Ronaldo had not got the memo about lavender oil keeping moths away. Presumably they do not miss opportunities quite like Ronaldo did in the Austria game.
Who would have thought it even in the topsy-turvy times in which we live? A humble moth the star of this tournament? Not since David Gower took the Queensland skies in a Tiger Moth 25 years ago has that particular insect earned such notoriety in sport. It could only get more famous if it promptly resigns.
A footballer’s nightmare it may be but Sunday’s final upon which a ‘plague’ of moths descended was an entomologist’s dream and what a spectacular conclusion to the Lepidopterist Society’s week-long annual meeting which drew to a finish in Colorado on Sunday. Just like Ronaldo’s Moth, let’s hope they also had a live feed from Paris.
I have been scouring the internet in search of my own moth trap. The more practical minded could probably fix up a cardboard box and light bulb for a few quid or, conversely, you can pick them off your headlights after a night drive although identification can be problematic.
The ‘Skinner’ looks a good mid-range set-up, coming in at £200 with good reviews, while the ‘Robinson’ retails for about double that. However the ‘Stade de France,’ which comes in at an eye-watering £250 million, is in an absolute league of its own. It does not just collect moths, it collects entire populations and whoever committed the erreur d’ecolier of leaving the lights on the night before should at least be made to pay the Stade’s electric bill.
Of course, with every lepidopterist worth his salt in America at the moment, identification of the species which attended the final has not been easy but according to the Natural History Museum, the large yellow underwing (noctua pronuba) kind of fits. One of its traits is being “freely attracted to light” while, the bumf adds, while also underestimating the size of the snare, ensuring “hundreds can arrive at the trap in peak season”.
Another species to get through security and the crack French swat team was the Silver Y (autographa gamma), a migrant moth which is also common in Britain, at least, until Article 50 is triggered.
‘Y?’ No doubt that is what Ronaldo was asking. Because the modern moth, it seems, like everyone else these days, is attracted to fame.
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