Unstoppable Ireland heading for a ‘greenwash’ with England toiling

S o, apart from St Patrick’s Day, the Cheltenham Festival and a potential Ireland grand slam in the Six Nations championship, could this week be any bigger from an Irish perspective? For aficionados of green-shirted sporting history, the answer is yes. The Ireland team has been playing international rugby for 148 years and, as yet, has never clinched a grand slam in Dublin’s fair city.

The only time it has happened previously on the island of Ireland was back in 1948 when, with the great Jackie Kyle in his pomp, Ireland beat Wales 6-3 at Ravenhill in Belfast. If that was a huge deal at the time – “If Wales don’t score again I’ll be canonised,” the Irish prop Jack Daly joked after scoring the crucial try – it will be nothing compared to the Celtic house party should the world’s No 1-ranked team complete a clean sweep at England’s expense on Saturday.

While Ireland have won more recent grand slams in Cardiff in 2009 and Twickenham in 2018, triumphing on home soil really is the oval-ball holy grail. Remarkably France and Wales have both done so four times apiece at home this century alone, while Scotland will forever cherish their timeless 1984 and 1990 heydays at Murrayfield. England have not managed it since 1995, before nine of the starting XV last Saturday were even born.

Which begs another question: could Saturday, to steal from U2’s back catalogue, be Irish rugby’s most beautiful day? Given their litany of ill-starred past World Cup campaigns, the ingredients are clearly all there. It is no minor achievement in itself to unite the four proud provinces of Leinster, Ulster, Munster and Connacht in joyful communion and their local heroes are increasingly a match for any of their fabled predecessors.

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