The still photo of Thierry Henry controlling the ball 'basketball style' is burnt onto the retinas of most Irish football fans, though Nathan Collins was otherwise disposed for most of the evening.
The 22-year old defender only caught sight of Henry's famous act of larceny thanks to the big screen at the train station on the way back from a ChildLine gig.
"I was coming back from a Cheerios concert, if you can remember them, the charity ones," Collins told the assembled media at today's press conference at Abbotstown.
"I was with my mam and older brother. We were walking back to the train station and watching on the screen there. There was a big crowd of people waiting for the train watching it and, yeah, everyone was fuming. I just remember rowdy people, that's all I remember.
The ChildLine concerts, sponsored by Cheerios, ran between 1997 and 2014 and Collins struggles to recall the full line-up from the '09 event.
"All I remember is JLS!" [Wikipedia tells us that Westlife, The Saturdays and The Script were among the other more forgettable acts that played the O2 on the infamous night of 18 November 2009.]
Thursday's game doesn't mark a return to the precise scene of that particular crime.
Stade de France has been block booked by the oval ball crew for the next month and so Ireland are heading across the city to the Parc des Princes, the national team's regular home until the mid 1990s and still home to Paris Saint Germain. Irish fans of a much older vintage than Collins have enough bitter memories of injustice at that venue too, notably from the 1982 World Cup qualifying campaign.
The match in Paris is the first installment of a critical two-part window, which could land the final blow on the embattled Kenny regime or alternatively could give the manager a vital filip heading into the latter stages.
While Netherlands' form has looked patchy - they were stuffed 4-0 in Paris and laboured past Gibraltar at home - the French remain an exceptionally intimidating prospect.
What would represent a good window, in the circumstances?
"A good window...it's hard to say," says Collins. "A good window would be six points, wouldn't it? We would take that 100%. We just go and try and cause problems.
"There are a lot of chances there. Especially at home, with the crowd behind us we can do anything. I think we can go and get a win, easily. Away from home I think we can cause so many problems and I think we can nick something.
"They are two top teams but three points, four points, anything is good. If we can get something out of these two games, it puts it right back into contention."
Heading to the French capital, Ireland are at least emboldened by their energetic and competitive display at home to the World Cup runners-up last March, where a rasping Benjamin Pavard strike, capitalising on a sloppy pass from Josh Cullen, settled the game.
It was in the dying seconds that Collins himself looked to have secured a famous point, his bullet header from a late corner forcing a staggering, front-page worthy save from Mike Maignon.
Aside from that, one of the most noteworthy aspects of the evening was the anonymity of the normally terrifying Kylian Mbappe, with the Irish defence succeeding in snuffing out the PSG galactico.
"It's probably mentally harder than physically," says Collins, of that task. "You know what you are against, you know how good they can be and if you split off for a split second they are going to hurt you.
"We know his quality. Every game he plays he causes everyone problems. There's no way you can do it on your own, one v one, he beats anyone.
"We have to defend as a unit, we have to defend as a team and back each other. If he does beat us, then there has to be more people waiting to come up against him.
"It's about balancing it all. He is a massive threat. We were able to deal with him once and we have to draw confidence from that.
"It’s what I’ve said before, it’s what you want to do as a footballer, you want to play against the best, you want to try and test yourself against the best and this is the stage to do it on. I’m relishing the challenge."
After Saturday, there's growing excitement that Ireland may at last have found their own goalscoring wonder, after a good decade lamenting the absence of one.
Evan Ferguson's headline grabbing hat-trick came as little surprise to Collins, who's seen him up close and is hoping he can replicate it soon - very soon - in an international shirt.
"I wasn't surprised. I saw the first and I was, like, he can go and score a few more now.
"I know how good he is and we all know how good he is, so it's no surprise. It doesn’t change much, but it’s good seeing an Irish player up there scoring a hat-trick and it’s lovely to see.
"I’m buzzing for him, let’s hope he can do it for us against France."
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