Red rose and shamrock do battle
My, my, how time flies. It was all of 55 years ago, when, led by the great Jack Kyle, Ireland last won the "Home Countries" rugby championship with a close 6-3 victory over Wales. The expanded competition is now called the
RBS Six Nations Championship and it will be decided today at Lansdowne Road in Dublin. With wins over Scotland, Italy, France and Wales, the Irish are just 80 minutes away from writing a chapter of rugby history. All that stands in the way is England. But there's the rub.
Even the most optimistic Irish supporter has to accept hat the odds are against the home side. England, one of the best teams in the world at the moment, defeated Australia, New Zealand and South Africa last November, and imperiously dismissed Scotland 40-9 last weekend, while an erratic Ireland emerged from Cardiff with a very lucky 25-24 win over Wales. So, form favours England, but they'll be facing a psyched up Irish team, on the verge of only its second Grand Slam in history and in a packed Lansdowne Road, to boot. Because the Triple Crown, Grand Slam and Championship are up for grabs today the red rose won't have it easy in Dublin.
Diarist of the day: Malcolm Muggeridge, 30 March 1948"Started reading Goebbels' Diary. Interested to note that he, too [was a] writer manqué who had begun by producing a bad novel and a play which no theatre would put on. Most men of action seem to be writers manqué and correspondingly most writers, men of action manqué. Interesting theme."
