COMMENT: "That's so Irish" now means something completely different

THERE was a strange moment during the last 10 minutes of the Ireland-England rugby match last weekend. England were attacking the Irish line. It was a situation for phrases that evoke warfare: ‘battering’, ‘pummelling’, ‘last-ditch effort’, ‘holding on grimly’ and ‘Paul O’Connell’.

It was a familiar sight for Irish sports fans: Ireland initially doing well against an opponent from a larger country. In the past, we bit our nails in fear of the moment that the opponent from the larger country realised what was going on, flicked a switch, and then we got what was coming to us.

Except this time it was different. Watching it, I felt — and I think I wasn’t the only one — calm. Like when you’re on a plane and it drops tens of feet in preparation for landing, there’s an unpleasant ‘bottomish’ feeling, but the rational part of your brain knows that, on the balance of probabilities, the pilot’s preparation and experience, in tandem with the technology at their disposal, mean you’re not going to die.