IT was an afternoon when even the hardest taskmaster bosses may have felt some sympathy for stragglers arriving late back from lunch.

Who, after all, wanted to be on duty when England and Wales were facing off in the European championships in France?

With the hype around the match at fever pitch, some employers and workers wrote off the afternoon.

While Hounslow Council in west London scored a few headlines by setting up a television for staff to watch the action for two hours, in Islington the Town Hall was a little more reserved over the rules. “Time off work, or agreement to particular flexitime arrangements, are always at the manager’s discretion – through this and any other sporting event,” was the line.

Nevertheless, as popular as the pubs and bars along Holloway Road and Upper Street are, they are not usually as busy on a Thursday afternoon as they were yesterday.

Even those who normally dismiss the sport as 22 men running around maniacally after a bit of leather seemed to have been seduced by the home nations clash. The extra drama of a last-minute winning goal for the England team added to the excitement.

And so it proved when the Tribune, all in the name of on-the-scene reporting, checked out some well-known bars and found them teeming with people, despite the hour of the day.

“We all just walked off site at kick-off,” said a labourer catching the game with two colleagues. “I won’t be going back to work now that we’ve won. I’ll be out celebrating.”

Meanwhile, a student from King’s College said he had held a classroom referendum in a bid to get a lecture postponed after it clashed with the game. He admitted slipping away from university but revealed: “We submitted a survey where 80 per cent of respondents were in favour of moving the lecture. The tutors thanked us for the information but said: ‘Our decision is to keep the lecture at the original time’.”

There were other stories of defiance. A shop worker told how he “kicked off” when he found himself on the rota to work.

He said: “I am the only one who likes football so I made a fuss and they changed the rota so I could work. It will be worth it if England win.”

He got his wish. Just.

• Keywords
  FOOTBALL, EMPLOYEES, PUBLIC HOUSES
• Geographical keyword
  ISLINGTON (LONDON BOROUGH)