In the game of life, Breakfasteers are always winning

LET us call them the Breakfasteers, those rugby fans who were having ‘the Full Irish’ in various establishments last Saturday morning, watching the quarter-finals of their World Cup.

They are an unusual crowd, these Breakfasteers; at least they are not like other sporting crowds in one crucial respect — they seem to take defeat more lightly than most.

Many of them and their ilk were over in Japan of course; they were the ones who featured prominently in the many TV pictures of the Irish fans celebrating.

It wasn’t that they were taking their beating with quiet resignation, or being exceptionally sportsmanlike in their acceptance of defeat, it looked like some of them were actually celebrating.

And since they couldn’t possibly be celebrating the game itself, they must have been celebrating the simple joy of being alive and being an Irish rugby supporter in Japan — regardless of the result.

Regardless of the result.

Yes I wrote those words, in relation to a sporting event — regardless of the result, the Breakfasteers will always find some way to enjoy the occasion anyway. Because they are in the company of like-minded individuals from other countries who may be their opponents on the day, but who know that ultimately they are all on the same side in the game of life — the winning side.

Now I’m not saying that they are totally indifferent to the result, I’m just saying that the wounds are not so deep that they’ll actually look unhappy, let alone devastated as a ‘soccer’ fan might be in similar circumstances. Or the fans of some other sport who can get quite upset if they lose. Almost as if… well, almost as if it matters.

I mean, it has to be said that the actual players came up a little short out there in Japan. For those of us who watch four or five games of rugby a year as we have always done, finding that sufficient unto our needs, this looked like one of those Ireland teams of the amateur era which was always getting slaughtered by these professional guys from the Southern Hemisphere — and a few from the Northern Hemisphere too.

It was poor from them. But that’s OK with me, the game of rugby has no importance in my life.

The remarkable thing is that it’s also OK with those who will actually go all the way to Japan to see it — them and the Breakfasteers back home, sitting there in a haze of bonhomie while the guys on the park are having a total ’mare. There’s about 15 minutes gone and they’re already in garbage time.

The RTE panel, though they seem to be excellent in most respects, do not engage with these great socio-cultural issues, nor indeed with the fact that Ireland couldn’t possibly win, because their captain is 37 years old.

After the game, Stephen Ferris in fairness seemed a bit down, but like the other panellists I didn’t hear him making that basic yet incontrovertible statement that Ireland couldn’t possibly win, because their captain is 37 years old.

This is international rugby, a rough game, and if you have a captain who is closer to 40 than 30, you clearly have let things slide to such an extent, the entire tournament for you is being played in garbage time.

Nor did they analyse the behaviour of the fans, as we have done here — on Super Sunday, Roy Keane was condemning some of the players of Liverpool and Man Utd for shaking hands and even hugging in the tunnel. But on the RTE panel, nobody saw fit to condemn those Irish rugby fans for their carefree attitude to the game.

So again, we have to do it for them, because frankly, those of us who watch the four or five games of rugby a year, are entitled — just once — to watch an Ireland rugby team that doesn’t crash and burn at their World Cup.

And yes, at this stage we’d want a Full Irish along with it.