O'Connell Street was a battlefield. Makeshift barricades were erected at various points.

Several fires were blazing and the crowd was screaming for blood.

If anything, they hated the gardai more than they hated the loyalist marchers. "Come on ye Black and Tan bastards!" they roared. "Redcoat scum!" and "SS, RUC!" Every time a garda was hit by a missile, there was massive cheering.

The gardai were hopelessly amateurish and incompetent in comparison to the police in the North. They were completely unprepared and, even in the heat of the rioting, didn't manage to seal off side-streets.

The rioting was a mainly working-class, male affair.

What was surprising, though, was that plenty of respectablelooking citizens not engaged in violence nevertheless appeared sympathetic to the rioters.

"The government was only asking for trouble allowing the Orangemen down here. We could never let them pass the GPO, " said one man.

"Where's McDowell now?" a protestor yelled. The loathing of the justice minister was unanimous. Many of the rioters, like their Northern counterparts in years gone by, wore Celtic tops and trainers, with scarves pulled over their faces to hide their identity. The 'trendier' rioters wore PLO scarves. Even injured protestors, with blood pouring down their faces, continued to riot.

Posters with the names of those killed by loyalist paramilitaries lay in the gutter, discarded as the rioters ran for cover before another attack on gardai. The covers of water mains were detached and water poured everywhere. The pavement, at various points, was spattered in blood.

The roadworks on O'Connell Street meant a ready supply of missiles. It seemed inconceivable gardai hadn't realised in advance this would lead to disaster for them. A young man wearing a 'Remember the hunger-strike' t-shirt broke up huge rocks.

"Gives us more ammo!" a rioter shouted to him. Every now and then, pink flares were thrown, lighting up the sky. Someone started singing 'Sean South of Garryowen' and soon everyone was singing it. "Tiocfaidh ar la!" rang out every few minutes.

There was a strongly sectarian football element. "If you hate the Orange bastards, clap your hands, " was chanted.

Then, they sang 'The Fields of Athenry'.

Sirens rang out all over the place. Fire engines and ambulances arrived. The windows of several businesses were smashed. 'Business as usual' read the sign in the window of Ann Summers but even that pretence was abandoned. "We are, we are, we are the IRA, " sang the crowd. A Spanish man working in Dublin said he fully supported the rioters.

"I'm told you have West Brits in your country, " he said, and his Irish friend nodded in agreement.

At the GPO, the protestors decided sitting down on the road was temporarily better than rioting. The anthem of peaceful protest, 'We shall not, we shall not be moved', was now adopted. A motorcycle was set on fire. "Somebody should be selling hot-dogs, " said one man as youths gathered in front of the blaze.

Another man didn't think Dublin resembled the North at all: "It's not like Belfast, it's more like Baghdad."