Praise the myth-makers in our new Sunday service
“The promise of ‘the rugby’ and other interests meant a good portion of the 4,025 Semple Stadium crowd had left just as this game was sent into extra-time thanks to Michael Heffernan’s long-range free.”
Countdown. End of days territory. Fitting, in some ways, the ceremonial beginning of the end should come back at the birthplace.
The GAA was founded on November 1, to mark the legendary demise of the Fianna, the mythological warriors who went about their business with incredible physicality at battle-time.
The date was chosen to signify the “rebirth of Irish heroes”.
And so, on the eve of Samhain in a fortnight’s time, it is written that, on the ancient battlefield of Twickers, the circle of life shall complete and a fresh band of fearsome warriors will bestride the land we now know as Rugby Country.
The smart lads at Guinness saw this coming a long way out. Their ‘Not Men, But Giants’ campaign, which once saw brave chieftains of the ash run wild across our rugged terrain, is ancient history now.
Expect a reprise in the coming weeks, with minor tweaks:
Not Giants, but Giants who went to Good Schools.
As our new heroes prepare for their next adventure tomorrow, the mythologising has continued apace, tales of triumph and tragedy piling high.
“The most extraordinary level of bravery I have ever seen,” was how Keith Wood described the great Dead Rubber Battle of the Millennium.
“The saddest sporting sight I ever saw was Paul O’Connell being taken off the Cardiff battlefield to thunderous and emotional ovation,” tweeted Lise Hand of the Irish Independent, beckoning the eggpocalypse closer.
“The most heroic effort in Irish history,” wrote journalist and blogger Gavin Sheridan, forgetting entirely the time Fionn MacCumhaill saved Tara by piercing his own skin with a spear to stay awake in the face of the fairy Aileen’s dangerous lullaby.
Where once The Irish Times might have been the modern equivalent of the ancient Book of Lismore, where we could read the tallest tales of derring-do, thankfully there are now many such texts, such as the Irish Examiner.
Yesterday, ROG warned of the dangerous Pumas, a mythical “dog with size and fight”.
This time round, Setanta won’t be needed to drive a sliotar down its throat.
These guys possess every human reserve of fortitude, even on a subsistence diet of whey. And they own the softest hands.
The adverts assure us these are giants of the highest moral standards, who have rejected human failings such as apartheid and homophobia.
And theirs is the most epic bantz, if the great national hilarity at Lukey missing the ball off the tee is anything to go by.
“That could be the winning of the World Cup,” reckoned Woody on The Sin Bin on Thursday night, savouring the footage one more time.
If the Queen’s guards or the US air force are trained not to laugh, ours is an army marching on lolz.
In Joe Schmidt, of course, they have the honourary leader who has sucked all the thumbs and gained all the knowledge. Which has its downsides.
Where folklore allows us learn of Fionn’s exhaustive preparations for battle, we must make do with brief footage of these guys ‘shifting tin’ in the gym.
Schmidt’s legendary attention to detail has kept the serious stuff behind closed doors, when the ‘front five’ are doubtless buried to the knee at the gain line and must fend off the attack of eight spear-throwing warriors without getting in front of the hindmost foot.
Naturally, just as Fionn and his brethren were allowed a certain lawlessness in pursuit of what was rightfully theirs, so too are our modern heroes.
Certainly when it comes to the age old practice of giving a Frenchman a box.
What might be seen as an act of gross and reckless indiscipline, what might well draw endless rounds of condemnation and hand-wringing, were it in pursuit of less worthy ends, can here be regarded as standard practice.
As one modern bard on the wireless put it; “O’Brien’s swinging arm caught Pape’s midriff.”
Or as the warrior O’Brien himself explained: “I just wanted to break free.”
In the face of this courageous bid for freedom, it is convenient that some of the game’s mythology can be turned on its head, as needs be.
So an account of enemy Pape’s incredible feats of valour could be used as evidence that warrior O’Brien’s box may not have carried his customary mighty force.
“Despite this discomfort, the veteran French lock made five carries and an astonishing 17 tackles.”
Thankfully, the wronged O’Brien will be back long before Samhain.
On business networks such as LinkedIn, where many modern myth-makers gather, we can already see them pick through the latest success for ‘corporate takeaways’. No doubt they will take particular interest in this quest for light touch regulation.
It is not, of course, just the forgotten warriors of Nenagh and Drom-Inch and their likes we will soon turn our backs on completely.
There is nothing left at all for lesser, venal tribes.
As the imported filidh Nigel Owens puts it, time and again, so lyrically: “This is not soccer.”
So reviled are soccer’s foot-soldiers now, in this land, one of the fiercest Anglo-Saxon warriors of them all, Ryan Shawcross, one of the brains behind an attempt to fuse the two codes at Stoke, felt the need this week to make the case for one of our reviled warriors, a man who has also bestrode the Potteries.
“It’s no surprise that he’s got over 50 caps for Ireland,” said Ryan of Glenn Whelan. “He’s a top player,” his own searing honesty eschewing the ‘top, top’.
“When he is not in the team, we are not as good. That shows how good he is,” the Shawcross redemption attempt continued, in its eloquent way.
It fell on deaf ears. There is nothing but revulsion for this great man now, who has battled incredible odds to captain a Premier League team.
Nothing here for him at all. Except, legend has it, the right to park his two Ferraris.
The victims of this takeover are many. There will be no place either for archbishops this time on Samhain — nor any need, when we have lay saints like Paulie to worship. Indeed, as the old godless warrior ways once gave way to religion, there are signs now that rugby may well be our new religion. Or cult anyway.
Just as the old mottos; Glaine ár gcroí, neart ár ngéag, beart de réir ár mbriathar — truth in our hearts, strength in our arms, honesty in our speech — gave way to Pull Hard, he’s no relation and Our Father, Who Art in Heaven — we will now pray... Together standing tall, shoulder to shoulder, we’ll answer Ireland’s call.
Heroes & Villains
Clare SHC final, would it have been that hard for someone to find change jerseys? pic.twitter.com/ADakeMI6At
— Museum of Jerseys (@museumofjerseys) October 12, 2015
Went above and beyond in their attempts to re-establish Banner unity by allowing Sixmilebridge and Clonlara play a county final in the same shirts.
Their efforts don’t need any mythologising.
Such is the state of great contentment and excitement he has the Scousers in, it almost seems unfair to make them play a match.
“Wenger is arrogant,” claimed the man who insists he should be managing Real Madrid.
No longer eligible for these pages after the British High Court ruled it is not a sport. If ‘45’ hasn’t got the nod, very hard to make a case for them.
Almost beginning to worry about him.
