YAY! It’s the feel good factor that only comes around once every 4 years for rugby aficionado’s across the world. It’s time to do battle for Webb Ellis Trophy in New Zealand in the 2011 Rugby World Cup. Occasions like this even excite the part-time rugby fan, the one who’ll switch on the telly on for not only the analysis, but for the full 80 minutes! I’m sure the whole country will be taking notice of Irish squad this September (and hopefully October). Unlike the FIFA World Cup, the IRB Rugby World Cup is something we regularly qualify for and have a chance of doing well in too!
Unless you’ve been lucky enough to be hiding in a pimped out cave blissfully ignorant of the world outside for the last few years, you’ll know that world has been plunged into a financial downfall, with the effects no better demonstrated here in Ireland. Not that the IRFU or FAI would notice! Money is scarce and sacrifices have to be made. People can’t afford to be forking out Celtic Tiger figures to go to matches anymore. If you wanted to go to New Zealand and see the Boys in Green take on the world, a full complete package would have cost you €6,950. For me, a student in LYIT, that is 800 euro more than I’m entitled to with the grant. If the World Cup wasn’t your fancy, you could splash out the same figure on a new Jaguar XK series sports car (available on carzone.ie). This figure is compounded by reports claiming that hotels in the Host Country are price gouging ahead of the tournament, with prices quoted over €1500 for 10 night stays during competition time. This isn’t realistic, this is a joke. It is estimated 1000 fans from Ireland will make the journey and if we are to make some noise in stadiums, capacity ranging from 15’000 to 60’000, we’ll be relying heavily on the Diaspora already in the region.
That leaves the majority of Irish rugby fans back home, watching it on the TV, which present its own problems. Like Australia 8 years ago, our games will be played early in the morning. For the fan that enjoys a few pints while watching a game, this is a nightmare. The idea of a 12 hour drinking session starting at am is something that should only be considered on St.Patricks Day, I know it’s the World Cup and everything but let’s save the serious sessions if we make the final!!! Thankfully all of our group games are on at the weekend , but when it comes to the last 8 and onwards, they’ll be taking place during the week. That leaves you facing a dilemma of choosing either watching the quarter-final showdown with either Wales or South Africa (according to the person who runs this page), or going to work! Or going to college, or still lying in bed in the morning!
Coverage of every match will be available either on RTE, Setanta Sports or Sky Sports. The return of RTE is a massive relief for me after my experiences of 4 years ago. In the build-up to France 2007, I was horrified to read that TV3 had stolen the rights to broadcast the games, specifically the Ireland matches, from under RTE’s noses! For anyone who doesn’t know me, I’m not a fan of TV3, I’m quite the opposite. I’m possibly the person who hates them the most in Ireland. To keep this rant short, I think their naive in their broadcasting, show barely any Irish programmes or original creations (copying what ITV already has isn’t original) and when it comes to showing sport, they are DIABOLICAL! This World Cup wasn’t any different. Matt Cooper is a fraud who trundles & fumbles his way through analysis and presenting. You can have renowned and knowledgeable pundits alongside you but what good is it when just about struggle to ask the obvious questions. He isn’t a genuine sports fan or trained sports journalist and for all we know, could be reading it all off a card. It made for horrific viewing. The live commentary was probably worse. Someone by the name of Conor McNamara from BBC Radio 5 Live lasted all of 3 seconds before annoying me. The last time I heard him was when he was possibly ejaculating over Brian O’Driscoll’s try in the fateful game vs. Argentina. Alongside him was former Ireland international Phillip Matthews... yes, I hadn’t heard of him either, and haven’t heard since!
The nightmare didn’t end there. Setanta were making massive attempts to become a big player in the sports broadcasting world back then before entering bankruptcy in 2009. Leading their coverage was Daire O’Brien, who has since moved onto RTE. Unlike Cooper, he happens to know something about sport and succeeds, in my opinion, in not driving you mad with his presenting skills. Alongside him were the likes of Ciaran Fitzgerald, Matt Williams, Donal Lenihan and other names which weren’t as recognisable. With the exception of Williams, they were average and suffered mainly because they were stalwarts of the amateur days. What let Setanta down was their lead commentator Fred Cogley. An Ulsterman’s accent is difficult enough to understand at the best of times, but Cogley's was of a higher pitch, that not only made understanding him a lost cause, but required the use of ear-plugs during his coverage. And that was before we came close to scoring a try.
My only other outlet was UTV. Along with TV3, UTV is the other Irish version of ITV, specifically catering for North of this isle. This is where problems arose. ITV had employed Stuart Barnes & Miles Harrison of Sky Sports fame to do the commentary, and a good job they were doing too. And they had a decent set-up for analysis; the respectable Jim Rosenthal along with other high profile names (Francois Pienaar is the only one that comes to mind) in studio to describe the events in France. However, if you were in Ireland, you were stuck with UTV and for pre-match, half-time and full-time analysis, UTV saw fit to shove Adrian Logan, and former Irish internationals David Humphreys, Nigel Carr and Justin Harrison into a small studio designed to look like a friendly living room to describe the nightmare unfolding before them. It all looked uncomfortable; the analysis suffered as result but not without the predictable whinge of asking why didn’t Paddy Wallace any other Ulster player get more time making that little bit more pathetic. It was strange watching UTV making an effort for all of Ireland for a change, the whinges just resumed normal service.
Setanta have once again boasted that they will be showing every game live and are rebranding themselves as official Rugby World Channel, all of this I managed to take in during one of their annoyingly bad radio adverts. They have already lost my respect before now for their woeful scheduling lists on the free-view Setanta Ireland channel, and leaving anything decent they have for Setanta Sports 1 subscribers. I can see something similar happening for the World Cup and I’d think you’d be mad to subscribe to them over Sky Sports or ESPN to be honest. But then again, RTE isn’t everyones fancy either, Ryle Nugent can be tough to bear at times to be fair. But like O’Herlihy, Giles Dunphy and Brady in football, I’m used to seeing McGurk, Pope and the legendary George Hook casting their views over Irish rugby. RTE will be showing every Irish game live and for me that will be enough! I don’t have that much experience with Sky Sports and Rugby, they’ve had the rights to the Heineken Cup for a couple of years now so most Irish fans may have a good idea what to expect. I’d only consider watching Sky Sports if it were on in a pub, but the chances of pubs opening up early for the games may be unlikely.
I can’t finish this article without acknowledging George Hamilton, Irish commentating stalwart, who is recovering from heart surgery. It’d be more than likely he’d be on his way to New Zealand now if it were not for his condition and I’m sure every Irish sports fan will wish him a speedy recovery and return to the commentary position. It was his voice that took you through probably the best moment we’ve ever had in the Rugby World Cup, Gordon Hamiltons late try at Lansdowne Road in the 1991 quarter final v Australia
Typical of us to throw away a winning position with 2 minutes left!
Hope you enjoy the World Cup wherever you are, COME ON IRELAND!!!
Francis Creaven
Francis Creaven
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