What really insults the Scots

The Scotch First Minister, Jack McConnell, will doubtless be huddled before a television screen today, dressed in a Portugal football shirt and perhaps munching salted cod, out of respect. An awful lot of his compatriots will be doing the same thing: the Treaty of Windsor, signed with Portugal in 1386, may well be the longest lasting alliance in English military history, but it will be superseded by the less formal, 90-minute Treaty of Gelsenkirchen between Scotland and Portugal. If the Portuguese win their World Cup football game against England, there will be immense jubilation north of the border — free drinks all round, the waving of the Portuguese flag out of every bar and car, the consumption of vast amounts of bacalhau with ‘neeps and tatties’, symbolising the union of Europe’s two most limited and primitive cuisines. If England win, however, the infuriated Scotch will most likely go on the rampage, attacking any convenient English target.