Ireland’s rugby fighting spirit

Last summer they defeated the All Blacks, New Zealand, for the first time in a three-game series. Last November she finished undefeated in test matches by beating Australia, Fiji and South Africa. In the first two matches of the 2023 Six Nations he dug out Cardiff’s Principality by dominating Wales 34-10 (but already 27-3 at halftime) and set Dublin’s Aviva Stadium on fire by beating France 32-19. So much so that in the world rugby rankings it is number 1 (over France and the All Blacks). And today (at 3.15 pm, Olimpico in Rome, on SkySport 1 and TV8) he will play against Italy.

Ireland is to rugby what Flanders is to cycling and Hungary to water polo, as African Americans are to basketball and Kenyans to marathon running. An instinct, a school, a tradition, a vocation. Ireland which, in the national rugby team, unites the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland in the same green shirt and the same crest, the clover. Ireland, which has always recognized itself in the fighting spirit, that of struggle and combat, but which, now, has much more. The Ireland of the legendary Willie John McBride, second line, who invented a simple and effective scheme: it was enough to say 99 for the players to lose interest in the ball and dedicate themselves only to their direct opponents, not exactly with tea and biscuits. The Ireland of the divine Brian O’Driscoll, center, named the sexiest Irishman (but among the five jurors was the model Glenda Gilson, his girlfriend at the time), whom the Irish are referring to when they say they believe in God, but also in Bod (B for Brian, O for O’, D for Driscoll), another god, the god of rugby. Today the Ireland of the glacial Johnny Sexton, fly-half and footballer, who between one match and another – as the rugbyologist Vittorio Munari jokes – “is put in the fridge to be protected even from the passage of time”.

How Ireland managed to hoist itself to the top of the world, per Marco Bortolami, head coach at Benetton Treviso, is no mystery: “First of all politics: focusing on your players, distributed in the four provinces – Leinster, Munster, Ulster and Connacht -, selecting a few, but very strong, athletes from other federations, such as the NZ (and Maori) winger James Lowe and NZ scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park, following a three-year residency. The experiences of Irish abroad, such as Sexton himself at Racing in Paris, never worked out. Thus the best Irish sign centralized contracts, i.e. directly with their federation, are satisfied economically, retained at home and sipped in the most important commitments. And if in England the system is cracked, with the bankruptcies of two clubs like Wasps and Worcester, and if in Wales it is unsafe, with the agitation (almost going to strike) of the national teams also in this Six Nations and even more so in the September world, in Ireland it seems to be holding up perfectly.

Then there is the training activity, the one that Bortolami would like to be able to “steal”: “An expanded high-performance system, but which is based on an enormous diffusion in terms of the number of practitioners. The base is made up of around 200,000 men’s and 5,000 women’s players, 1,900 men’s and 300 women’s senior teams, higher percentages than other British teams, almost 4 per cent, double that of Wales and Scotland, still more than England. The chosen area remains that of Dublin, around twenty schools and colleges, from Black Rock to Saint Andrews, where physical, technical and human qualities are trained and measured, as well as the ability to receive information. Therefore, not only fundamentals but also principles, not only instinct but also feeling”.

The third cornerstone is in the style of play: “The continuous, obsessive, tireless search for the advantage line, a bit like in Rugby League, rugby XIII – explains Bortolami -. It has become their trademark. The example comes from Leinster, at the top in the United Rugby Championship (the so-called Celtic League), Munster is getting there, Ulster is halfway there, Connacht has a more expansive game but it’s not that far away”. The fourth lies in the culture of play: “Roots, identity, belonging, aggregation, I dare even speak of religion. It is enough to enter a team’s club house to breathe its history, recognize its spirit, inhabit its colours”.

It seems impossible to beat Ireland: “They have managed to rejuvenate themselves without trauma, because the younger players arrive at the top level ready. Thus the starting XV can count on a large squad, with more alternatives for each role. And even for the more delicate one, the fly-half, Sexton will finally have his good stand-in at the World Cup”.