by Mike Martin @thefootietweet
To begin at a tangent, I have finally worked out what it is about this World Cup that seems so much classier than in other recent international sporting championships. It is the national anthems.
Normally, you will recall, anthems have been 'led' by some panjandrum of an operatic soloist. At Hampden Park, it is usually some bekilted soul such as Ronnie Browne butchering the life out of Flower Of Scotland – which is a bad enough dirge to begin with – and yelling whatever it is the crowd all shout after 'and send him homeward'. Elsewhere, particularly at Wembley cup finals, it is usually some up-and-coming 'celebrity' opera singer – the sort who's CDs are available in Asda – with a good future behind them who drench the tune in unnecessary frippery and coloratura before pointlessly going up the octave in the last bar, only to miss the final high note by the width of the Thames.
Not for the Rugby World Cup, who have made the tasteful decision to use the New Zealand Choral Federation 'Anthem Choirs', who have thus far been providing classy and subtle renditions of the anthems as the composer wrote them. Even the antipodean temptation for throwing in the odd new-agey harmonic confection is, by and large, passed by.
Anyhow, the game. This was the match every World Cup needs, a contest of the most immersive kind and a result which turns the whole tournament inside out. There is now the strong possibility that the Tri Nations countries will all be in the same half of the draw come the knockout stage.
The discerning sport fan reserves a particular kind of joy for watching Australia lose at any sport they hold even slightly dear and there was plenty to enjoy here. Much of the match's appeal was in the familiarity of its features; the useless Wallaby front frow, their crass errors in possession and their dismal scrummaging.
Every four years the rugby world asks itself the same question. Have Australia finally found, among their 22 million mostly sport-mad inhabitants, finally found themselves any prop forwards who look half competent on the international stage. Usually, the answer is a blunt 'no'. This time around it is 'yes; there is Benn Robinson'. Robinson is injured.
This was a match in which everything Australia holds dear about its rugby union team was systematically, almost ritually deconstructed by a resurgent Irish pack. (Their backs, though they played perfectly well, were not really the point.) This was not just about their constant infringements at the scrum. Australia, undermined at source, panicked and became incapable of making good decisions when in possession.
Will Genia ran into a teammate and Australia were penalized for 'shepherding', or blocking an opponent's tackle without the ball. A late close-range penalty was run when trailing by nine when a goal would have brought them within winning range. Several phases of play later, fly half Quade Cooper – tonight not a maverick entertainer but a dunderheaded liability – threw a needlessly extravant flick pass straight into Tommy Bowe's hands. The Irish wing's interception break did not bring a try but it won the match by taking Australia into their own 22 in the last minute.
Ireland, on the other hand, made sensible decisions that worked. With Jonathan Sexton's goal-kicking inconsistent, Ronan O'Gara was introduced to slot two second half penalties that took Ireland out of reach. This was not a gutsy, hard fought narrow win against the odds; it was a straightforward rout. Had Sexton's radar been better calibrated, the Australians would have been truly humiliated. The Auckland crowd, in which the natives were uniformly supporting the Irish for reasons which scarcely need outlining here, lapped it up. In the post-match interviews, broadcast over the statium PA system, Ronan O'Gara was cheered like an All Black hero; Australia coach Robbie Deans was hissed like a pantomime villain.
We can now all look forward to the likely quarter final between South Africa and Australia. The delicious thing is, one of them has to lose.
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