For an Irish team to post 40 points on New Zealand and break a 111 year losing streak, in the senior men’s game at least, made for some amount of celebration.
When the dust settles the reality is that only one group of players can lay claim to being the first and this will live with them throughout and beyond their careers.
As well as the players though there will have been serious rubbing of hands at a variety of different locations over the way in which this extended 80 minutes will reflect on a wider group…
Vodafone
As new sponsors coming fresh to the sport this year, after a World Cup and looking to make an immediate connection with fans, Vodafone will be a big winner from this result.
The lift in interest around the return fixture this month, the introduction of young players who will be key players in the coming years and the sense that this could be the trigger for a period of world dominance will all lead to more fan engagement, more jersey sales with the new logo and more benefit for the sponsor and their imaginative #TeamofUs campaign.
AIG
If Ireland had lost this Chicago trip could have been painted as just a commercial stop which was a created event that had no grounding in the traditional calendar of the sport.
AIG’s hosting in Chicago though plays well to its support of Rugby in the USA and even though the All Blacks team who wear the brand on their jersey was a loser, the branding on the pitch, on the photographs from Soldier Field and in the minds of those influential business leaders who were part of the travelling party going out to Chicago will have a lasting impact here in Ireland.
Joe Schmidt
Two Championships and an engaging public persona meant that Joe Schmidt’s contract extension was welcomed by many though not universally with mutterings about how the style of play was unattractive and the team had come up short where it mattered most at the Rugby World Cup.
Now though, in his first game of his new contract through to 2019, Schmidt has delivered the biggest result in irish International Rugby history and did so not by attritional defence but by scoring 40 points on the All Blacks. That is the kind of impact that will secure his place in the history books.
Enda McNulty
McNulty has come in for some sustained and ferocious criticism in the Sunday Independent of late from columnist Joe Brolly whose view of sports psychology and performance consultancy could be described as withering at best.
McNulty was a key part of the team travelling Chicago though and the mental strength praised as central to the win will boost once more his own reputation and that of his Motiv8 consultancy among the business audience in thrall to rugby.
Guinness
As sponsors of the Autumn Series, Guinness could yet stand to be the biggest short term beneficiaries of this win.
Anticipation for the return game later this month will now be at a level considered off the charts until this win and while all the tickets are sold out for the Aviva Stadium the idea of collectively watching the game will be good for sales and great for the brand equity in an ongoing battle for the hearts and mouths of the rugby audience with Heineken.
eir Sport
The live audience for the win may not have been as big as if the game were broadcast on RTE but Rugby has long since gone down the path of pay TV and eir Sport certainly put themselves front and centre stage in this first major event since the transfer of identity from Setanta Sport.
With Conor McGregor live in New York coming up next weekend and the ongoing coverage of Champions Cup Rugby, Premier league and Champions’ League soccer and more the channel will have many more converts, both for the free service as part of an eir broadband contract and for the pay version available to sky though not Virgin customers.
The fact that it also has the rights to broadcast the 2019 Rugby World Cup will also not be lost on the sports TV audience they seek to attract.
Women’s Rugby
Ireland’s hosting next summer of the Women’s Rugby World Cup will receive a boost from the rising tide of sentiment for rugby as a whole.
Media coverage of the win, especially in the broadcast sphere also was very aware off the fact that while this was a first for the men that the irish Women’s team had already beaten the New Zealand team at World Cup level.
Munster, Leinster, Connacht and Ulster Rugby
The provinces will all get a boost in the general halo effect for the sport arising from the win. With all four involved in crucial Champions’ Cup and ongoing Guinness Pro12 matches over the coming months the continued rise in star appeal of home based players will be good for attendance and fan engagement at the four provinces.
Leinster had the lions share of players on the pitch for the game, Ulster had the Captain in Rory Best but perhaps it will be a resurgent Munster with Conor Murray and CJ Stander at the helm of a new dawn for the province that will benefit most in the wake of the 8 tribute to Anthony Foley and the sentiment still flowing from his loss.
