Eamonn Fitzgerald's Rainy Day

A week ago, we were in a very comfortable bar on Telesforo Aranzadi in the capital of Biscay Province warming up for the Ireland-France Rugby World Cup game. The city, which is busy shedding its industrial skin and rapidly becoming a European cultural centre, has a venerable rugby tradition as exemplified by the Universitario Bilbao club.

Anyway, although we were surrounded by mainly French-speaking rugby fans, we did not feel the least intimidated by these burly types because, truth to be told, they were the epitome of graciousness. The only time they slipped into anything resembling ominous nationalism was when La Marseillaise was played. Then, the rafters rang, the eyes watered and the hair on assembled heads went vertical. It is a magnificent melody and such is its magic that it even managed to make Sébastien Chabal appear handsome.

What did the Irish have to offer to counter this? No tricolour and a farrago called "Ireland's Call", written by the Northern Ireland composer, Phil Coulter. Who he? Well, if you can imagine a cross between James Last and Richard Clayderman you've got Phil Coulter and greenish ooze of the most odious kind. Yuck!

Sarah Carey doesn't "really give a shit about rugby" but she watched the Ireland-Georgia game with "the farce that is Ireland's Call and the stupid makey up flag. Like, what's the point?" Her contempt for these PC symbols helped her nail it, though: "And I thought...you know what guys, if you were playing for a country and had an anthem and a flag you believed in, you wouldn't be arsing around that pitch like stupid posh school boys who just got a kicking from a mucker team with a bit of heart."

It is a disgrace that Ireland, with its famed wordsmiths and its treasure trove of exquisite folk melodies, cannot come up with something that is tunefully pleasing and inspirational for all its peoples, north and south. The country's misfortune is that it has a Seamus Heaney at a time when it has no Seán Ó Riada. On Sunday, Ireland need to score at least four tries in Paris while denying the Argentineans a bonus point by winning by at least eight points. Without a song to cry for, it cannot be done.