Boston has been hit by a wave of Scotland fans unlike anything the city expected, with as many as 50,000 Scots descending for the World Cup and turning the build-up to Friday night’s match against Morocco at Foxborough into a rolling street party.
Dave McCarthy said the scale of it has only sharpened the mood inside the Scottish camp and among the traveling supporters. “We might not get to another one of these, so we are going to enjoy every single second of this one,” he said, adding that qualification alone is something to celebrate and that when it comes to excitement, exuberance, friendliness and fandom, “there is no holding back.”
Back in December, Meet Boston realized the Tartan Army was on its way, but even that early warning did not capture what the city is seeing now. Scotland beat Haiti on Saturday for its first World Cup victory in 36 years, and the celebration spilled well beyond the stadium. About 6,000 fans turned the Red Sox game on Sunday night into a Scottish soccer chant event, while pubs sweltered under chanting crowds and some local bars ran out of beer before the night was done.
That welcome has become part of the story as much as the football. The traveling Scots have been placing traffic cones atop statues around Boston, a nod to a tradition they brought from home, and the city has leaned into the spectacle even as the crowds test its bars and public spaces. Dave O’Donnell said the arrival of the Tartan Army had struck gold for Boston, calling the impact “immense and electrifying.”
The friction is in the scale. Boston is being praised for embracing the visitors, yet the same surge has left bars packed shoulder to shoulder and strained the city’s supplies as the party moved from one pub to the next. What happens in Foxborough on Friday night will matter next, but the more immediate question is how many of those Scots will make the trip there after turning Boston into the center of the World Cup’s noise.
For now, the city is living through the answer in real time. Scotland arrived looking for a football tournament; it found a full-scale takeover of Boston, and Morocco World Cup week is only halfway done.
