I don’t care who wins, I just want a great game, says RTE’s NI commentator George Hamilton

But how does Hamilton feel about the prospect of commentating on a first England triumph in 55 years?

“I don’t have a preference really (if England win it). From my perspective, the better the game, the better it is for us. But I don’t have a preference either way,” he said.

“We do tremendous figures every time England play, it goes through the roof, so people want to see England, whether it’s to see them win or get knocked out or whether it’s to see their favourite players from the Premier League. They are box office and there’s no question about that.”

He refers to a joke from a Twitter user about a BBC reporter using the line ‘a nation holds its breath’ ahead of the England v Germany match.

“Somebody went on Twitter and said ‘ah we’ll give you Declan Rice and Jack Grealish but you can’t have our most iconic sporting quote’. I think that’s the level people look at it, it’s with kind of a tongue in cheek sideways glance.

“They’re not gonna get too exorcised about whether England win or they don’t. They will play the part up to a point, but I don’t think it’s as big a deal as people make out,” Hamilton says. “You can’t support Leeds United and not want Kalvin Phillips to do half-decently, you can’t support Everton and not want Jordan Pickford to have another clean sheet, that’s just the way it is. It’s not as black and white as we’d like to make it out to be,” he adds.

Hamilton — who entered his 70s last year — was born in Belfast in 1950, a few years after the great George Best and from the same area, the Cregagh Road.

“We were christened in the same church,” he says.

“I came from the Cregagh Road and there was a team called Cregagh Boys and George I think played for them. But he was the talk of the place because he was so good.”

Hamilton moved south in 1978 and now has a great connection with both sides of the border.

The veteran broadcaster insists he has no intention of hanging up the mic, as he balances match commentary and his weekend shows on RTE Lyric FM.

“I’m still enjoying what I’m doing and there’s an audience for what I do and as long as the audience want me to do it, I’ll do it,” he says.

“Never say never, I have no idea what might be in the plans at RTE, but you ask the question of me, I don’t have any intention.

“I’ve two prongs to my RTE involvement and the other one is Lyric which is going very well indeed, the Saturday and Sunday show. I’ve no plans to pack that in either.”