Real change the only way to succeed - Connacht gives us all a lesson

What a wonderful story. What a wonderful, uplifting, happy-ending romance. What an against-the-odds achievement. What a challenging, inspiring act of individual and collective defiance — and how very easy and uplifting it is to celebrate. But it offers so much more.

Connacht’s great Pro12 title win over Leinster, in Edinburgh on Saturday, is all of those things, but, if we take a moment and step back from what is probably a once-in-a- decade party even by the West of Ireland’s exhausting, liver-bruising standards, the underdog’s victory offers a priceless lesson for nearly every facet of Irish life. How wonderful it would be if we chose to absorb and implement it. How sad it is that such a prospect seems as remote as Connacht’s hopes of becoming title holders did even six months ago. But then, you’d never know. The penny might drop as it did so very loudly — and rewardingly — several years ago in Galway.

Just over a decade ago, Connacht rugby was in disarray, disrespected on the affluent side of the Shannon. It was underfunded and struggled to achieve anything other than bottom-of-the-table moral victories, and sometimes not even those. The team was, just like so many of our public services today, underachieving and just a shadow of what it should be and yearned to be. It took a little longer, and outside voices, to say what it could be. Like some of our public services today — health, education, and justice — it was hardly fit for purpose.