Irish feel at home in Cardiff

Ever since they first turned out for a rumble on the left bank of the Taff, Ireland have usually made a point of picking something up in Cardiff. 

They have been on the receiving end of the odd Triple Crown and Grand Slam, a wooden spoon or two, at least one right Royal punch-up and a sending off during an era of such permissive officiating that referees would invariably turn blind eyes to the equivalent of GBH.

Even after all this time, no Irish team has picked up anything quite as outrageous as the one that blazed the trail to Cardiff in 1884, a horse-drawn era long before the youngest of the Fords from West Cork got round to inventing his Model T.