I’ve always had an interesting
relationship with rugby. The earliest game I remember watching on TV was an
Ireland v Wales game in what was then the Five Nations. I was about fourteen
and working in a pub in my home town labouring away one Saturday afternoon,
cleaning ashtrays and the other general detritus left behind by the previous
night’s revellers. I had the upstairs lounge to myself and while I cleaned
tables I turned the television on for company.
I can’t remember the result or
anything else about the game, but for some reason it has lodged in my memory. I
think it’s there because it throws up the contradictions that rugby causes me.
The very fact that I was working in a pub at the age of fourteen is a give
away. I come from a firmly working class background where the only way I could
procure a bike to get me to school was to get a job and pay for it myself.
Rugby, then as now, was played by
the sort of middle class toff in Ireland that I generally despised and would
have harboured dreams of putting up against the wall come the great revolution.
As a child, we played soccer on the streets, Gaelic Football at school and at the
local club and aped the sports we periodically saw on television, be it
Wimbledon or athletics. We never played rugby. I don’t even know anyone in my
town that had an oval shaped ball.
And yet, I remember being
fascinated by that game. I think the technical rules appealed to my intellect
and I’ll admit that the sight of eight burly men driving eight others down the
pitch while the crowd howled “heave” appealed to my animal sentiments too.
As I got older, I continued to
battle with class sensitivity while my friendships and amorous intentions
pulled me towards the middle class. My favourite social destination in my late
teens was the rugby club disco on a Saturday night, where you could meet the Doctor’s
daughters who lived on the hill that overlooked the terraced house that I grew
up in.
I balanced precariously on the
dividing line between my working class past and my middle class future, often
falling on one side or other depending on the company I held. I was a social chameleon,
comfortable singing off-colour songs at Arsenal matches, while discussing the
merits of playing a forwards based game in wet weather at Twickenham with my
professional actuarial colleagues.
However, it took me a long time
to build up the required social capital to be a true rugby devotee. I had
contacts in the soccer world to secure tickets for international matches. But
getting access to rugby tickets was a different matter. They were the preserve
of people who were members of clubs that would never have me as a member.
I solved this by finding a
girlfriend who had social capital I could only dream of. So, it turned out that
the first live game of rugby I attended was the World Cup Final in 1991. I
followed this up with another visit to Twickenham the following spring to see
Ireland lose 38-9 to the old enemy, England (I have to thank Wikipedia for that
score as my memory is weaker than Ireland’s defence that day).
I do remember being in the
toilets under the West Stand in the immediate aftermath of the match. A rotund
English gent in a sheepskin jacket with a large red rosette ambled up beside
me.
“Bad luck, old Chap”, he bellowed
when he noticed my Ireland scarf.
My most recent direct encounter
with England fans was at a soccer international and my old self kicked in.
“Thanks, but you know where you
can stick your fuckin’ chariot”, I replied.
After that girl dumped me, I lost
my easy access to rugby tickets but maintained my love for the game. I’ve been
to most of the great stadiums of the world to see the oval ball game played and
it has provided me with some of my best days out.
And now I find myself living in
New Zealand, a country supposedly obsessed with rugby. I thought I would become
immersed with the game in the way I was with AFL when I moved to Melbourne. It
hasn’t quite worked out that way.
To start with New Zealand is not
quite as fascinated with rugby as people overseas think. The Maori and Pacific communities are into
rugby league. The Chinese and Indians are into basketball and on-line gaming
and many white parents are keen on their kids playing soccer.
The country only really gets into
rugby when the All Blacks are playing and even then, the expectations that it
will be an easy win takes away some of the excitement.
I’ve also noticed that I’m only
really interested in international rugby. The Super 15 is the primary club
competition in this part of the world, but I wouldn’t watch one of those games
if it was played in my backyard.
Then the World Cup came along.
This is the first one I’ve witnessed in New Zealand and the first one that
Ireland went into as number one in the world. It was all looking good until the
country of my birth and the country I live in came face to face in the quarter
finals. The Auckland papers were full of references to Leprechauns and ginger haired
Guinness drinkers in the week before the game. Ireland was patronised and
written off before the game in a way that no other team would be. I had my
reply all ready for posting if and when we won the match. It wasn’t to be, but
sport is a fickle mistress as the Kiwis found out when England beat them in the
semi-finals.
I’ll watch the final with a
weathered eye, more interested in tactics than results. And may the best team
win, as long it’s not England.
