TV review: Guinness, sheep, Irish dancing — A League of Their Own road trip to Ireland
A League of Their Own: Dingle to Dover — they learn that Irish dancing is stressful if you haven't done it before
Four minutes into (Sky Max and NOW TV app), and we’ve already had mentions of Guinness, Michael Flatley and a ceilí-load of diddly-aye. Not bad going given that the first two minutes is a recap of the kind of capers that the lads got up to, on other road trips. So no, this is not going to be an examination of life in 21 st century Ireland.
The hosts, Andrew ‘Freddie’ Flintoff and Jamie Redknapp, cruise around the Dingle peninsula in a giant 4x4, before meeting up with comedian Romesh Ranganathan and former footballer, Patrice Evra on the pier at Dunquin. They are given a task by a local man, Donncha, to herd sheep up a hill.
It’s awful. And I love it.
The last thing we need right now is a BBC4 documentary on the changing face of Ireland. There’s something reassuring about four semi-famous lads from the British media larking around Ireland, with soothing images of the Blasket Islands in the background. British people are never going to change their mind about us — the least we could do is entice them over for a spot of tourism.
If the banter gets too much, you can always just press mute. It worked for me more than once, particularly when Jamie Redknapp opened his mouth.
And the local, Donncha, put in a star turn with a look that screamed, “Jesus, I have to show these gobshites how to herd sheep — I suppose it beats working for a living.”
Then they go ploughing, in “the heart of the beautiful county Laois” as they call it, which suggests that a good bit of the script was written by Fáilte Ireland. This is to be the site of the “first point-scoring challenge”, because blokes can’t do anything unless it’s a competition.
Banter and messing aside, this did a good enough job of showing what’s actually involved in a ploughing championship — I always thought it was just loads of radio stations down from Dublin pretending to be interested in culchies.
Then they headed to Newcastle. In England: to take part in the 25 th anniversary performance of Riverdance, but still. At this point, I think Fáilte Ireland was probably looking for its money back.
I also think it was a valuable piece of public broadcasting though. It was a warning to anyone who thinks it’s good idea to have a ceilí at their wedding. Irish dancing is stressful if you haven’t done it before, even if you’re after a bottle of prosecco.
The four lads went on stage in front of 6,000 people. Freddie Flintoff thought it would be ok, because Newcastle types would have been drinking all day. He didn’t say this about the Irish, which was just as well.
And that was the end of the Irish leg of their road-trip. I enjoyed it because I like looking at bits of Ireland. Next week, they’re in Britain. I won’t be watching.
