Another Paddy-whack but ‘All Blacks there for the taking’
LONDON: What’s the Irish for déjà vu? England have trodden this painful path twice before in Dublin, beaten on the Six Nations Championship’s final day in 2001 and 2011 when they had a Grand Slam at stake – but this magnificent, focussed, clever effort by Ireland surely topped both of those much-recalled days of recent rugby history.
England had mitigating circumstances to point to on those previous occasions, based around delays and disruptive injuries – whereas this time they looked well set to round off a campaign, that had already delivered them a second successive Championship title, by completing their world-record 19th straight win, and a first back-to-back Slam since 1991 and 1992.
Instead at the end of a clattering, entertaining, occasionally controversial match it was left to the visiting captain Dylan Hartley to reprise the glum role of Matt Dawson in 2001 here, and Nick Easter 10 years later, by receiving the champions’ trophy in the aftermath of a morale-shredding defeat.
While England had been rightly feted for winning their last 18 matches, Ireland had won only half of theirs – but one of those was the famous victory in Chicago last November that stopped the All Blacks’ world-record sequence at 18, so the men in green had “form”.
They also had an excellent record at this stadium to protect, with only two losses in their previous 17 matches here, and none in the Six Nations Championship under head coach Joe Schmidt.
The future is exciting for both teams as they will be Europe’s vanguard alongside New Zealand and Australia as the top four seeds for the 2019 World Cup draw in Japan in May.
Eddie Jones had one simple message for his England team: “Be proud of yourselves, boys.”
The head coach had just suffered his first defeat as England boss, 15 months after he took the job following the dismal 2015 Rugby World Cup showing. What followed was an 18-match winning streak, two Six Nations titles and, just, one Grand Slam, having seen the other slip away but an agonising five points.
But as it was, Jones had to field questions of what could have been.
Yet he was quick to praise his side, both for their efforts on the day and their performances during the world record-equalling run that sees them well on course to meet Jones’ plan to win the next World Cup.
“We are Six Nations champions, back-to-back which is a fantastic achievement,” he said. “We’re joint world record holders, but we weren’t good enough today. And we have to accept we weren’t good enough today. Next time we get together as the full squad will be in November and we’ll look to right what happened today.”
He added: “We are 14 months into a four-year project as I have been saying. We have been chuffed with the results we have had but realism tells us we have still got a lot to do. We were caught in certain areas today and full credit to Ireland. There are brilliantly coached and they executed their plans well.
“We will learn from it. We are going to have more setbacks as we go to the World Cup. How many teams have a 90 percent winning record at Test level – there are not too many, the All Blacks are the only ones and we have been doing that since the last World Cup.
“We are batting at a pretty good average – even Don Bradman got zero when he played his last Test. Obviously we are disappointed – but we will fight another day. It is not the end of the world.”
Rather than criticise his own players as you might imagine Jones would do in the hope of getting a reaction, the Australian wanted to stress just how good Ireland were on Saturday evening.
“I thought our effort today was good – I thought Ireland played superbly,” Jones added.
He still had the good grace to suggest that the All Blacks were there for the taking.
The British and Irish Lions travel to New Zealand for a three-Test series in June and July.
England, by contrast, are not scheduled to face the world champions until 2018, although reports this week suggested officials were looking at re-arranging the Twickenham fixture calendar to set up a November 4 clash between the international game’s two topranked teams.
“I expect at least 15 of our guys to go on the Lions tour, I’d be disappointed if we don’t have that many guys in,” said Jones.
“And I think they’ll have a massive shout (of winning a first series in New Zealand since 1971).
“New Zealand, as Ireland have shown, are there for the taking,” the Australian added in a reference to Ireland’s 40-29 win in Chicago in November that stopped the All Blacks’ run at 18 victories in a row.
“I can can’t wait for us to play them either.” – The Independent
STAR-STUDDED BOLT FAREWELL
A CONSTELLATION of global athletics stars will be present to pay homage to Usain Bolt as he runs his last race on Jamaican soil during the second staging of the JN-Racers Grand Prix at the National Stadium in Kingston on Saturday.
Bolt’s coach Glen Mills explained that Bolt had been the flag-bearer for the Racers Track Club for the past decade, and that it was only fitting that he be honoured by the club before he takes his leave from competitive athletics.
“It will be my last competition on home soil,” said Bolt, whose first international success came in Kingston at the 2002 IAAF World Junior Championships. “I might shed a tear even though I’m not an emotional person as I close out where it started on Jamaican soil.”
The meeting – dubbed ‘Salute to a Legend’ – will feature appearances of three world record-holders, four Olympic champions and six world champions, in addition, of course, to Bolt himself.
World 400m record-holder Wayde van Niekerk – who last year set an African 300m record at the Racers Grand Prix – will be back in Kingston for this year’s meeting.
Other athletes set to compete in the men’s sprint events at the meeting include 2011 world 100m champion Yohan Blake, former world 100m record-holder Asafa Powell, world leader Akani Simbine. – ANA
the world more reasons to take notice of what is happening in South Africa.
During the morning heats 18-year-old Gift Leotlela set a new South African junior 100m record when he clocked 10.12secs in the heats chopping 0.07secs off Simbine’s mark from 2012.
On the first day of the championships 16-year-old Sokwakhana Zazini posted a new world youth best in the 400m hurdles with a time of 48.84 seconds, improving the previous global mark by 0.17 seconds.