PETER JACKSON
THE MAN TRULY IN THE KNOW
Contrary to common belief, rugby‘s event of the year did not happen in Paris on the last Saturday of October but six months earlier at a public house on the Irish border.
Joe Biden, reversing the journey his great, great-grandfather made two centuries earlier, shuffled into The Windsor in downtown Dundalk on the second Wednesday of April. There, the 46th President of the United States of America did what none of the previous 45 had done. He talked rugby.
It may not have made a lot of sense at the time and, perhaps, only a little less so now, but ing the nits out of the President’s jumbled words is to miss the pick-point. Far from being prompted, Joe dared to tell a rugby tale in a place where footballing allegiances barely extend beyond Gaelic and soccer.
The President arrived wearing a knotted reminder of Ireland‘s thumping win over New Zealand in Chicago seven years earlier, a tie presented to him by Ireland’s most-capped full-back Rob Kearney, a native Dundalker and a distant cousin of Clan Biden.
“You see this tie with the shamrock on it,” he tells a small crowd of relatives squeezed into the main bar among the CIA, FBI and the rest of the presidential entourage. “This was given to me by a hell of rugby player.”
So far, so good. Then Joe volunteered a sentence which left even those well versed in Irish history a trifle bemused: “He beat the hell out of the Black and Tans.”
That would have made Rob Kearney 120, at least. By confusing the All Blacks with a despised British security force during the Irish War of Independence, the President inspired The Rugby Paper into our very own New Year Honours List as compiled by a panel who gave their precious time free of charge on one condition: strict anonymity.
Hollywood has its Oscars, we have our RAGs, Rugby’s Alternative Gongs. While some may be less than glad at their rag, a famous name as the No.1 RAG lends the list a little octogenarian glitz.
For revising the history of both New Zealand rugby and the Irish Civil War in two sentences:
Winner: Joe Biden.
For doing to one’s country what Liz Truss did to this one in 49 days as PM:
Winner: Eddie Jones.
It took him a little longer, 85 days, but the effect was much the same: the Wallabies reduced from so-called World Cup contenders to being knocked out before the knock-outs began.
For daring to appear in two of the three most magnificent Test matches of all time in a matter of months:
Joint winners: France and Ireland.
The matches in question: Ireland v France in the Six Nations, Ireland v New Zealand and France v South Africa in successive quarter-finals over the same World Cup weekend.
The Nostradamus RAG for non-prediction of the year:
Winner: Hamish McLennan,ex-chairman of Australia Rugby – “Eddie (Jones) instinctively understands the Australian way of playing rugby. He will lift the team to the next level.”
For proving himself the best back on the planet, in the air, on the ground and beneath it (e.g. his in-goal burrowing to stop Ireland’s Dan Sheehan during the monumental semi-final):
Winner: New Zealand’s Jordie Barrett.
Forward of the year:
Winner: South Africa’s Eben Etzebeth, below.
For glorious reminders that rugby is supposed to be a running game:
Winners: Coach Patrice Lagisquet, captain Tomas Appleton and the entire Portugal World Cup squad.
Rugby man of the year:
Winner, by a country mile: Kevin Sinfield. For showing the world how much can be raised for going the extra mile, in his case raising more than £8m for Motor Neurone Disease.
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