The build up and the anticipation of this year’s Rugby World Cup was like never before. World Rankings and Grand Slams all added fuel to the fever that this was going to be Ireland’s year, and that the trophy would be won in front of a raucous crowd of Irish fans who travelled by plane, train and roundabout journeys to be there.
Sunday morning though dawned with an empty feeling that maybe we had gotten ahead of ourselves again and that the elusive first win in a knock-out game at the tournament which really, really matters is still to be ticked off.
We at least have 24 hours longer to recover than the French fans who will look at our disappointment as being in the ha’penny place compared to theirs this morning after the hosts fell in an equally epic encounter against South Africa.
On Saturday morning this weekend was being billed as ushering in an era of Northern hemisphere dominance.
On Monday morning it is very much the natural order of the Southern Hemisphere that is standing tall.
We had ignored the power of history which has delivered eight of the previous nine Rugby World Cups to New Zealand, South Africa and Australia.
Wew had anticipated that next weekend’s Semi Final line up would be Ireland against Wales and France against England. What is it they say about how to make God laugh?
Instead it is England, who came into the tournament as the supposed weakest link of the home nations that stands alone against the might of the teams that have farmed the last four renewals and are red hot favourites to do so again.
Ireland will be at home, watching on the TV and for the most part getting ready for an earlier than anticipated return to Connacht, Leinster, Munster and Ulster, or in the case of Jonathan sexton and maybe more to whatever comes next.
It was at least a dignified exit. A one score loss to a team that came into the game with only the most marginal of considered inferiority. That is sport. Itr is binary with a loser for every winner in every game, and only one crowned Champion when all the scores are counted.
It does though especially hurt that we could not at least have led at some point.
The last time we did so in a World cup knock-out game was for three minutes, then four minutes, then seven minutes after Eric Elwood Penalties against France in the Quarter Final of the South Africa tournament of 1995.
That is tough to swallow for a nation that has become obsessed with the sport like very few others.
Now though it is back to the Guinness Six Nations and, as winter turns to spring that will once more fire up the faithful, like it always does.
The next time around for the Rugby World Cup will be in Australia and then in the United States. There could be players on the team that are still getting ready to do their Leaving Cert this year, just as Joe McCarthy was back in 2019, or for the US their Junior Cert.
Sport moves on relentlessly. We will still tune in to the semi-finals and the Final of this year’s tournament but it will be from the outside, again, and that is just a bit too raw to fully consider just quite yet.
