Pushing and pulling

It remains the most famous Irish try of them all. Everyone who was at Twickenham in 1982 swears the Irish pack pushed Gerry McLoughlin over the line. ‘Ginger’ sees it differently! Diarmuid O'Flynn reports.

DENIS HICKIE scores them with scorching pace, Brian O’Driscoll scores them with dazzling pizzazz, the top two in Irish international rugby history locked in their own ding-dong try-scoring battle, a new target set, it seems, in almost every game.

With Hickie out injured O’Driscoll has an opportunity on Saturday in the Triple Crown game against the Scots to extend the new record he set last week against the Italians.

Twenty four tries O’Driscoll has, but, given the age profile, it’s certain that number will rise into the 30s, perhaps even the 40s, before they're done. And yet, and yet. Even then, and just as it is now, probably the most famous try, the most memorable try, even perhaps the most crucial try, ever scored for Ireland was by ahumble prop.

And, though it wasn’t his only try in a green shirt (“I scored the first try of the Australian tour in 79, against Western Australia”, he points out), it was the only international try ever scored by one Gerry ‘Ginger’ McLoughlin.

Through the 1970s, Wales had dominated Five Nations rugby; 1980, Bill Beaumont-led England hadbroken through, won the Grand Slam. By 1982 then, these were the two superpowers, France always in the reckoning, poor old Ireland bringing up the rear with the Scots. Ireland had won only one Grand Slam in its long history, 1948, and hadn’t won the Triple Crown since 49. There had been many years when they’d come close, even to the fabled Welsh of the 70s, and 1981 had been yet another heartbreak year, leading in all four games at half-time, lost all four games by less than a single score. “Ireland’s best-ever whitewash!”, the wry summary of the great Ollie Campbell, Ireland's out-half in that period.

Then came 1982; Wales at home, Lansdowne Road, England in Twickers, then home again, Scotland. Ginger remembers: “Wales would have been at the same level as England around that time, but they were still a bogey team for us. In the end, however, we beat them well enough that day. That gave us huge confidence in ourselves, going into the England game, but it was still a major challenge to beat England away.”

Just as it did a few weeks ago, however, fortress Twickenham fell, narrowest of margins, 16-15. Full-back Hugo McNeill scored one of those flashing Hickie/O’Driscoll-type tries for Ireland, one that only the purists can still readily recall; Ginger scored the other, the one that still getsreplayed, over and over, every time an Irish team threatens to do something great. Right side of the park, broken play, the prop pops up, ball in hand, heads for the English line. In his path, though not for long, England full-back Marcus Rose. With reinforcements arriving from all angles, the rampaging McLoughlin, laterfamously described as ‘the truck without a brake’ was given added impetus, Rose was swept aside, ball grounded in the right corner.

“You must admit, you were given some assistance by all those chaps pushing you from behind”, the BBC interviewer intoned later. “Pushing?” laughed McLoughlin, “Sure I pulled them all with me!”

And there it was, the most famous try in Irish rugby history. “I don’t know is that still the case”, says Gerry now. “It was just one of those things on the day. When you play with good players, something is always going to happen, isn’t it? It was a different game then to what it is now. You had to be sharp, take advantage as much as you could of situations as they arose on the field, it wasn’t as structured as it is now, everyone seems to know in advance exactly what they have to do.

“There was a lot of experience in that team, people like Willie Duggan, Fergus Slattery, Phillip Orr, Ciaran Fitzgerald, Campbell; they would have been very involved in the close encounters, they set the tone of the game.”

The irony of that try is that McLoughlin isn’t a great admirer of props dashing around in the open field, then or now. “I wouldn't be very happy to see my props running all over the place; get the basics right first, that's what I believe, and that's what I think Eddie O'Sullivan isdoing now with this Irish team.

“A couple of years ago everyone seemed to be trying to use the props as strong ball-carriers, now they’re gone back again to basics, closeencounters. John Hayes is used more for his mauling now than for his driving around the field, they’re more inclined to use the second-rows now for that, guys who can take ball up with a bit of pace. England areinclined to use their props a bitalright, Wales too, but they have to try and move it around, they’re not good in the tight, and that cost them against England. You must get the tight sorted out first and I think that’s what O’Sullivan is doing.”

After Twickenham the focus then turned on the Scotland game and with it, the spotlight. It was a tough time for guys like Ginger, who hadn’t been used to the limelight.

“It was a very nervous time, the most nervous time of our lives. None of us had ever experienced anything like it, the whole country even, it had been so long. The build-up for a couple of weeks beforehand was huge, enough on its own to put the nerves into anyone. It hadn’thappened for so long, you knew if you lost it you were never going to get the chance again. It was only three wins, but trying to put those three wins together, that was the difficulty. Conditions weren’t the best on the day and Scotland managed to take the lead. But Campbell kicked the points and we won.”

Triple Crown. Cue festivities,national celebrations in which the team were happy to play a leading part. “Probably cost us the Grand Slam”, says Ginger, “but the Triple Crown was the big thing at the time.”

Four weeks later, they went down to France, but nobody really gave a damn. Even including his Twickenham try, the Lions tour in 1983, the Munster win over the All-Blacks in 78, the first precious Munster Cup medal in 76, that memory remains the highlight of McLoughlin’s career. Triple Crown win over Scotland.

“Ollie Campbell was the greatest player I ever played with, in any position, bar none. Today we have O’Driscoll, Darcy, guys who are up there. Ronan O’Gara too, I’m not going to say he's the perfect out-half, but he controls the game well, does a good job for Ireland and Munster.

“Anthony Foley is a very clever player, as was Brendan, his father, reads the game so well, Mr. Consistency. He’s like Mick Galwey, a catalyst, knows when to pick up the pace of the game, slow it down. We need our top players playing well, all the time; Malcolm O'Kelly didn’t really start to perform ’til he got that kick in the backside, he’s going to have continue to play like he did against England and Italy.”

If that happens, if Ireland can disrupt a lineout that’s on a par with their own, start to feed that backline, then you never know, another long wait could be about to come to an end. What odds, I wonder, John Hayes or Reggie Corrigan doing a Ginger McLoughlin?