Party time for Poland as the storm clouds start to clear

The Wi-Fi password at Gdansk airport's business lounge is not one quickly forgotten. It is Lech Walesa. From the stubborn union organiser who helped undermine communism to a key allowing transiting business passengers to access Facebook: as Simon Cowell would put it, that is some journey for the mustachioed freedom fighter. But as a symbolic summary of how far Poland has travelled since Walesa helped remove it from Soviet oppression, it is hard to beat.

This country has changed beyond all recognition in less than 25 years. When Walesa was leading his rebellion in the Gdansk shipyards, Poland was wilting under the grey blanket of Soviet rule, a place in which milk, bread, meat even, most uncomfortably of all, toilet paper was rationed. Now it is a vibrant, eager, hectic country, full of life and colour. And Euro 2012 was meant to signal the next stage on its transformation from sluggish socialist caterpillar into radiant, western-leaning commercial butterfly. At least that is how the tournament was sold by the prime minister Donald Tusk, who sanctioned billions of pounds of infrastructure investment on the promise that a football competition would give a geopolitical kick-start.

Not that everyone was convinced. Outside Walesa's erstwhile office in Gdansk, the Solidarity movement has hung a poster satirising Tusk's new-found football enthusiasm. "Bread not games" is the legend on the poster, a cry spray-painted on many a wall in the country. Not that anyone is short of bread in Poland. But many were not entirely convinced that a bit of a circus is sensible use of all that state cash.

On Tuesday night, however, it was hard to find anyone prepared to advertise such a view. When the Polish captain, Jakub Blaszczykowski, hammered in a magnificent equaliser during Poland's group game with Russia, everyone was too busy celebrating this hugely significant goal to moan.

Poland against Russia was a match awash with historical resonance, a summary of a lengthy mutual disdain which local and visiting meatheads alike played out on the streets of Warsaw. But that goal meant far more than just a chance to bloody the nose of the former colonial power. It was a goal that kept the hosts in the tournament.

Defeat against Russia would have effectively ended their involvement almost as soon as it had begun. Now, the hosts can look forward to their final group game today against the Czech Republic with real hope.

It is a truism of international football that for a tournament to come alive, it needs the hosts to prosper. And you sense that Poland needs this tournament to come alive more than most. At its start the dispatches were largely negative, detailing racism and hooliganism, homophobia and overpriced hotels. The worry, speaking to the locals, was that the local yobbos would, inevitably, ruin the message the rest of the country was hoping to convey: who would want to come here and spend their money if the chances of being beaten by a local skinhead were being advertised across the continent? But success for the locals and suddenly the narrative has changed to one of colour and fun, jollity and hope.

Since that goal there has been an upsurge in visible displays of unfettered patriotism about the place. There are more red and white flags fluttering from car windows, more people wandering around town in the national team jersey, more kids with the national flag painted on their faces chanting "Polska" in the street. That is why tournaments are so embraced by politicians; if things go well, they can deliver a sense of general wellbeing on which leaders can piggyback.

And the excitement has been growing here largely because it is not based on fancy. That response against their group's strongest team, Russia, was proof that Poland have a capable, committed, determined team, growing into the tournament's demands. Sure, their goalkeeper Wojciech Szczesny proved himself more a liability than a custodian in the first game against Greece. But, after his red card, his flapping is now restricted to the stands. Instead the German champion trio of Borussia Dortmund's Lukasz Piszczek, Blaszczykowski and the free-scoring Robert Lewandowski have given Poland a stability and craft that is beginning to bear fruit.

In Wroclaw, where the game against the Czechs will take place this evening, the sun has even arrived as if on cue, to shine on Polish aspirations. Suddenly everything looks brighter on the horizon. And if things go well against their neighbours, if progress arrives as expected, a quarter-final against Germany in Gdansk awaits. Now that is a prospect that excites the locals. Apparently there is some history with the Germans.