Tuarimí Éagsula Bainisteorachta agus an Séú Geansaí is Fiche

Tá an ionchoinse ar cad a tharla foireann rugbaí na hÉireann i gCorn Domhanda na Rugbaí, agus conas a d'fhágadar na h-oilean mar an bhfoireann is fearr in Éirinn riamh, agus a d'fhilleadar ar ais mar caoirigh ina gclampar féin (maith thú, a Bhabs!), faoi lánsheoil arís. Agus mise féin i mo mhac leinn síceolaíochta an duine, tá spéis mór ag bhur Spailpín faoin mbearna mór a d'éirigh idir na h-imreoirí ar an gcéad XV agus na h-imreoirí ar an ndara XV - na realtaí agus na maoir uisce, más maith libh.

Dar le Eamon Ó Súilleabháin, oiliúnóir foirne na hÉireann, sin mar a bhfuil an saol - tá Drico níos fearr leatsa agus mar sin caithfidh tú fanacht ar an mbinse agus do ghobsa a dúnadh, agus a ndúnadh go daingean. Ach tá tuairimí eile ag bainisteoirí eile, agus tá Seán Ó Mathúna, TD, taobh thiar céann de na scéalta is ansa liomsa maidir le foirne, imreoirí ar imeall na foirne, agus síceolaíocht an duine féin.

Bhí Seán Ó Mathúna ceapta mar bhainisteoir na Gaillimhe le cúpla bhlian, agus meas mór air ar fud na tíre tar éis rugadh na Gaillimhí ar a gcéad Craobh le dhá bhlian is triocha i 1998. Ag an am seo, bhí geansaithe nua ag Gaillimh agus bhí na h-imreoirí go leir cruinnithe le cheile ag Johnno chun phictiúr nua na foirne a thógail agus iadsan gleasta go leor ina ngeansaithe bhreá nua. Ach nuair a tháinig na geansaithe nua, ní raibh ach cúig gheansaí is fiche ann - bhí ceann amháin dul amú.

Duirt an t-imreoir gan geansaí gan bhac leis, go mbeidh sé ceart go leor, gurbh fhéidir leis an griangrafadóir an geansaí nua a chur isteach leis an bhFótóshiopa, ach ní ghlacfadh Johnno le seo. Amach leis a ghuthán phoca, chuir sé glaoch ar an bhfear taobh thiar na ngeansaithe nua, agus thóg Johnno an cluas uaidh go dtí go mbeadh an séú geansaí is fiche aige. Choinneáil Johnno an painéal le cheile, gan le déanamh acu ach féachaint ar a mbrógaí agus a dtóna a scríob, go dtí gur tháinig an séú geansaí seo. Ach nuair a tháinig an gheansaí ar dheireadh agus a thógadh an phictiúr agus a sciop na h-imreoirí abhaile, bhí fios maith acu nach raibh duine acu níos tabhactaí ná duine eile i súile Sheáin Uí Mathúna.

Beidh sé suimiúl go leor, nuair a dtiocfaidh na dirbheatháisneisí amach, cad a tharla don nglúin órga - agus an glúin gheal a bhí acu chun deochanna a thabhairt don nglúin órga agus tart acu.

FOCAL SCÓR: Insíodh dúinn leis na miosa gurbh iad seo an fhoireann is réidhe riamh. Má bhíodh siad réidh, cé ar thug cead dóibh dul amach le brogaí donna ar a gcosa agus culaithe dubha ar a ndroma? Ní ghlacfeadh Glenda leo dá mbeadh sí ann fós, bail ó Dhia uirthi!





Technorati Tags: Gaeilge, rugbaí, Eddie O'Sullivan, John O'Mahony

Penguin Celebrations

It gives your faithful correspondent great joy, on his visits to the bookstores, to see the Penguin Celebration displays.

Anyone that enjoys books is generally aware that you can, do, and should judge books by their covers. Reading one of those gorgeous old Pan James Bonds from the sixties is a completely different feeling to reading one of those cheap looking seventies editions. And it’s a marvellous idea on Penguin’s part to celebrate their publishing heritage by taking thirty-six books from the modern canon and republishing them according to the old Penguin house style – orange for fiction, green for crime, and so on. When you pick up Niall Ferguson’s Empire, for instance, browsing the Penguin Celebration edition is a completely different aesthetic experience to browsing the original. In fact, reading the Celebration edition reminded your Spailpín Fánach of nothing so much as the happy month he spent some years ago going fifteen heavyweight rounds with the blue Penguin edition of GM Trevelyan’s splendid Shortened History of England. A comparison Ferguson himself would be delighted with, I would suspect.

So many of the books in this Penguin celebration series are worth reading, just as so many, sadly, are not. Ferguson’s Empire was quite fascinating, especially to Irishmen and women of the Republican tradition, who may be looking at Imperial Britannia with slightly different eyes after this. Not that the Tans should ever have burned Cork or hanged Kevin Barry, of course – that was taking it too far.

Some splendid choices there in the fiction section, with White Teeth having pride of place in An Spailpín selection. The sniffy tone with which Zadie Smith is discussed in the British literary press is so disappointing – as far as your constant quillsman is concerned, Zadie Smith is the greatest chronicler of London daily life, in part and in entirety, since Dickens. Go on, my son!

Marina Lewycka’s Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian is one of those books that is almost rotten, and yet somehow quite good at the same time. Of course, living up to so magnificent a title was never going to be easy. I see Nick Hornby and our own Marian Keyes are in there as well. They shan’t be troubling An Spailpín Fánach. And I must catch up with Zoe Hellar’s Notes on a Scandal – she’s always been very much a favourite as a features journalist.

Robin Lane Fox’s The Classical World was such a disappointment, although An Spailpín’s hardback edition is a very impressive bookcase behemoth. Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation is endlessly fascinating, but why don’t people realise that it’s not about the food? You shouldn’t really need a book to tell you that eating in McDonald’s can’t be good for you; what’s fascinating about Fast Food Nation is how it charts how we’ve built this terrible industrial world we live in. Chomsky how are you.

Lovely to see Donna Tartt’s The Secret History in the crime section. The Secret History is one of those marvellous cult novels that will always generate a thrill of recognition between acolytes, like two Freemasons finding each other at the Electric Picnic. An enthusiast may go to his or her fellow believer, touch them lightly on the arm and say “Bunny simply had to die, you know.” There is only one correct response – “I know; there was no other way,” and then walk away in sorrow. Marvellous.

Given the choice, I would have left Rumpole in the Bailey myself and published John Mortimer’s marvellous volume of autobiography, Clinging to the Wreckage, instead. Mortimer’s family used to take turns reading poetry aloud (the only correct way to read poetry) at the dinner table during his childhood; Rumpole’s own attachment to Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch’s Oxford Book of English Verse brought to the light.

Travel books mean little to An Spailpín Fánach, as he’s a man that won’t go to the end of the garden if I can help it. The essay collection, too, is something of a disappointment. No Joan Didion, and the fact they’re only celebrating books that post-date the original Penguin covers rule out the master of the genre, William Hazlitt, but Jeremy Clarkson instead? I saw that World According to Clarkson translated into Polish in Borders in Blanchardstown last Wednesday night. I became weak, and had to stagger off into Lidl down the way, for a shot of that Hungarian hooch they have on special offer. Beautiful and all as these Penguin Celebrations editions are, we cannot be fully sure that books are entirely while with the Clarksons of the world are still on the loose. Couldn’t they have celebrated Anne Fadiman’s lovely Ex Libris instead? Jeremy Clarkson. Dear me.




Technorati Tags: culture, books, publishing, penguin, penguin celebrations

An Andúileach Drugaí, na Ceoltóirí Sráide agus Cór Nimhe na n-Aingeal

Bhí tuairisc ana-ghreannmhar ar Morning Ireland ar maidín faoi crinniú Comhairle BÁC atá chun coisc ar cheotóirí sráide ag seinnt ar sráideanna éigin na cathrach a phlé. Bhí bean éigin darbh Lucinda ann sa tuairisc, agus ise ag tabhairt amach faoi fear agus a thíuba ag seinnt ar na sráideanna agus gan ach dhá phort ar eolas aige, siadsan "When the Saints Go Marching In" agus "Happy Birthday to You." Mí-shástúil go leor, ar ndóigh, ach tá an bhean chéanna ina cónaí i mBéar an Teampaill, agus 'se mo thuairimse féin go mbeidh uirthi cur suas lena dóthain eile seachas a duine agus a thíuba.

Tá ceoltóirí sráide im' aigne agam as ucht rud a chonacas oíche Dé Sathairn. Bhíos ag cur fúm ar Shráid Grafton anseo i mBleá Cliath, ag breathnú ar chúrsaí na h-oíche ag cúig nóiméad chun a deich, nó mar sin. Tháinig triúr, beirt cailín agus buachaill, os comhair siopa HMV agus thosaíodar triúr ag canadh - an Wild Rover, más chuimhin orthu i gceart. Ach - agus tugaigí áire ar seo, tá sé tabhachtach - níor chanadar i stíl tradisiúnta, ach i stil chóir, cosuil le Cór na mBuachaillí Vienna nó Cór Airm Deirg na Rúise. Bhí beirt soprano ann, agus an buachaill mar countertenor, agus bhí gach rud go h-álainn, i ndáiríre, cé go raibh sé neamh-coitianta.

Ag an am céanna agus a thosaíodar ag seinnt, tháinig andúileach drugaí ina measc, agus eisean ar a bhealach anuas, chuig Fhaiche Stiofáin. Bhí gach rud ceart go leor leis, agus é féin "buzzin' like a bee," mar a dheirtear ina dhréam, nuair a chuala sé an ceol mí-dhomhanda seo.

Stop sé, agus d'fhéach sé thall is abhus, ag iarraigh foinse an cheoil a fháil amach. Bhí sé corraithe go leor, agus ní nach ionadh. Is docha gurbh iad Aslan agus Christy Dignam is ansa leis mar cheol, agus ní cloiseann sé an saigheas chanaidh seo amach ón eaglais. Agus nuair a chuala sé an ceol, ar shíl sé gurbh cór na n-aingeal iad na ceoltóirí, agus go raibh a dheireadh leis?

Tá fios ag gach andúileach drugaí gur crua an saol é, agus go bhfánann an bás taobh thiar gach aon choirnéal. Nuair a chuala mo dhuine an cór nimhe seo, ar shíl sé go raibh a uair tagtha faoi deireadh?

Bhí air bheith cinnte. Chuaigh sé chuig na ceoltóirí, agus ag iarraidh orthu "where are yiz from? Where are yiz from?"

Lean an cór ar aghaidh lena n-amhráin, agus d'fhill a chrógacht ar ais le mo dhuine. Ba é a thuairim, is dócha, más cór na n-ingeal iad agus iad ar a thóir, go mbeidh barántas éigin acu air, agus nuair nach raibh, bhí fios ag an andúileach drugaí go mairfeadh sé cúpla uair eile. "Well fair play to yiz," a bheannaigh sé díobh, agus ar aghaidh leis ar a bhealach arís, isteach i ndorchadas na h-oíche.

And it's no, nay, never,
No nay never no more
Will I play the wild rover
No never, no more....





Technorati Tags: Gaeilge, Baile Átha Cliath, ceol, andúileacha drugaí

Reddan, Steady - D'oh!

This bleary-eyed blogger is surprised that neither the traditional media, nor our new friends over at the marvellous Fear of God blog, has noted that in selecting his team to play France on Friday, Ireland head coach Eddie O’Sullivan has reverted to one of the most sacrosanct traditions of the old amateur era. This is the tradition of picking a man for the game against France in Paris for his very first cap, and then somehow expecting him to escape alive. For a time it was as much a part of the Parc des Princes experience as the cockerels, the band behind the goal and the adidas ball with the black spots that meant damnation for the Irish placekicker, who could no more kick the thing than a bag of potatoes.

Remember Ken O’Connell, the openside flanker of Sunday’s Well and Ireland? His career started and finished on the edge of the Bois de Boulonge, God love him. An Spailpín would have long forgotten the poor devil except that the Sunday Times, almost certainly when Tom English was still their rugby correspondent, interviewed O’Connell years later and asked him what it was like to make his debut in the Parc des Princes. Hell on Earth was his answer. Equally, Moss Keane reminisces in his recent autobiography about being raked in the face during a ruck in his international debut in Paris in 1974, when his aggressor drew so much blood that the dazed Moss realised that if only they had a bucket to collect the blood Ireland could have made black pudding.

Welcome to the big time, Eoin Reddan.

Eddie O’Sullivan’s relentless CV padding of recent years means that Eoin Reddan, with half-an-hour’s international rugby under his belt, is now expected to turn around the tanking Irish, and to do so while the likes of Serge Betsen or Chabal is trying to turn him into a melodeon. When Ireland played the might of the Pacific Islands in Ireland’s last game at Lansdowne Road, Reddan wasn’t even on the bench. Issac Boss started at scrum-half, and Peter Alexander Stringer was on the bench. Stringer had seventy caps and won the Heineken Cup for Munster the preceding May. What could he show from the bench that hadn’t been seen already?

And the cost of that is that Eoin Reddan is now being asked to do the impossible, to turn Ireland out of the nosedive they’re in currently. An Spailpín Fánach hopes it works out for him, but my goodness gracious, it’s certainly a lot to ask.

The bizarre thing is, of course, that scrum-half isn’t the position most in need of change. There is no point in dropping the Piper Hickie either; as Donal Lenihan pointed out on Newstalk’s Off the Ball last night, dropping Hickie is like dropping a corner forward in football if you’re getting a hiding. Generally, you’ll find the problems are nearer the action.

What An Spailpín Fánach would do – presuming that he can’t turn back the clock two years and see those autumn internationals as they are – is start Alan Quinlan. Whether it’s in the second row or the back row I don’t care; I would give himself and Leamy 00 licenses and tell them to just take their chances with the cards. Besides, if they do a good enough job, the ref will be too scared to bin either of them. This would have the beneficial effect of putting the French on the back foot, and let’s not forget that Freddy Michalak (did you see the state of him on Sunday night? Good God) isn’t going to fancy being on the back foot much – least of all with Leamy or Quinlan trying to rip it off.

But out from that, there’s no hope. The campaign is already a disaster, and the only thing the team can do now, realistically, is try to stave off humiliation. As a fellow Mayoman and Ballinaman I wish Gavin Duffy all the best, and it’s my dearest wish that he can be the toast of Paris come Friday night, but anybody who has any appreciation of the impossible thrill of seeing a man running with ball in hand has to have his or her heart broken by the shameful current treatment of Geordan Murphy. These are grim days for Irish rugby.







Technorati Tags: rugby, Rugby World Cup, Ireland, France, Eoin Reddan, Geordan Murphy, Eddie O'Sullivan

Land of Coop and Glory

The nation turned up or tuned in for an All-Munster All-Ireland Final yesterday, and got an All-Ulster one instead. Pucking, dragging, joulting and general sleeveenism as far as the eye could see yesterday. Nearly broke this Mayo’s aesthete’s heart – I thought someone could get hurt out there.

Before An Spailpín Fánach’s good friends from the North leap to their keyboards in defense of the Red Hand, to let me know I’m a soft Free Stater and the rest of it – relax fellas, I come to praise Ulster, not to bury her.

While Armagh and Tyrone beat Kerry on the field in 2002 and 2005, they still lost the propaganda war, and are still losing it. Pat Spillane came up with the puke football phrase in 2003, and it stuck. Rank hypocrisy on Spillane’s part of course, because anybody that hasn’t noticed by now that Kerrymen speak with bifurcated tongues hasn’t really been paying attention.

If you listen to the Kerry propaganda machine, you’d think that football in the Kingdom involves no contact at all, and simply involves a panel of judges giving marks out of six according to how one’s style matches Micko or Maurice. This is not the case. Kerry get down in the trenches with the best of them, and have done all through their history. It’s a little more obvious with this current generation, with the misfortunate Paul Galvin as the poster-boy of that approach, but trust your Spailpín on this one – they always knew how to take or land belts in the Kingdom. You don’t thirty-five All-Irelands simply executing fouettés en tournant and glissades en arrière in the shadow of the Hogan Stand you know.

And that’s all fine by An Spailpín Fánach. Certainly yesterday’s All-Ireland didn’t measure up with the great games of the past, but whatever chance of the that happening disappeared with the second Kerry goal. That doesn’t make Kerry bums and, equally, Kerry don’t give a rooty-toot-toot what the rest of the nation thinks. Football discussion in Kerry takes place strictly on their own terms among themselves, terms to which we, as strangers, can scarely comprehend. Thirty-five All-Irelands gives them the right to look on football in a manner different to the rest of the country. Paul Galvin himself said in 2004 that there’s always something special about winning your first All-Ireland; it’s only a Kerryman that would choose that particular adjective, first, because it’s only a Kerryman that can reasonably expect a second All-Ireland as a matter of course.

Equally, while Galvin is a lazy target for sanctimonious sports commentators, I’m pretty sure that he’s not barred from too many homes in his own spot. And if An Spailpín Fánach was picking a team in the morning, he would by golly have Galvin on it. And Dara Ó Sé too, whose failure to make the Sunday Game team of the year tells you more about the Sunday Game than it does about Ó Sé. Above anyone else, Ó Sé seems aware that the day to turn on the good stuff is the third Sunday in September. He was magisterial yesterday, just like always, and a real contender for man of the match, along with Donaghy and Aidan O’Mahony.

That Colm Cooper got man of the match after his magnificent 1-5 was the highlight of the game, and the feat for which the game will be remembered. Dara Ó Cinnéide, writing in Foinse the week before last, remarked on how odd it is that Cooper doesn’t have a higher profile, considering just now gosh-darned good he is – something of which Dara himself was all too aware, having been dropped himself for the precocious Gooch in 2002 or so.

Cooper has it all – Noel Walsh and your humble correspondent were discussing just how one would attempt to stop him if one were unfortunate enough to have to mark Cooper when Noel and I spoke on Shannonside / Northern Sound this lunchtime. I didn’t like to say it on air as I hate giving bad example to young people but it stuck me the only way to stop Cooper would be to have a lead pipe half-filled with concrete concealed in one’s sock, and to boff him with it every now and again when the ref isn’t looking and it’s been ensured that the umps aren’t squealers. Even then, as your correspondent recalls a despairing Cork back leaping on Cooper’s shoulders in the first half, only to slide off as Cooper charged for the Canal End goal, a lead pipe mightn’t do it. It might only get him riled, and in the mood to make a right show of you.

All thoughts in Kerry as the winter draws in will be on their three-in-a-row prospects for next year, and it will seem especially delicious to them down in their Kingdom now their great rivals of the century, Armagh and Tyrone, are in the doldrums. But when Dublin declined in the 1970s a power arose from a totally unexpected source to put the Kingdom crying, which is part of the sheer magic of the Championship. It’s only over, and I can’t wait for it to roll around again. In the meantime, hats off once more to Kerry, who are masters of the game in all its facets. Deserving and worthy champions.





Technorati Tags: Ireland, sport, culture, GAA, All-Ireland Final, Kerry, Cork, Colm Cooper, Gooch

Namibia's Call

Anyone with a heart or a knowledge of Irish rugby history was surely cheering for Namibia about ten minutes into the second half of their World Cup Group D opening match against Ireland last night. For the vast majority of the history of Irish rugby, Ireland were Namibia – whipping boys. Cannon fodder. Chum for the sharks. Willie John McBride, gloriously leading the Irish once more in that thrilling O2 ad, didn’t know what it was like to win in international rugby until he toured South Africa with the Lions in 1967, and he’d been playing since 1965.

Not only that, but Ireland have been just as much on the end of bizarre refereeing decisions as the Namibians were last night, when the pushover try was dubious, and Jerry Flannery’s try was clearly not a try at all. Remember Roger Quittenton’s somewhat heterodox refereeing of Ireland v Scotland in Murrayfield in 1987? Or JPR Williams’ infamous “professional foul” on Mike Gibson in Lansdowne Road in 1977, when Ireland were in with a shot at a triple crown when winning it still meant something? The mighty JPR was booed in Dublin for the rest of his time with Wales after that blot on an otherwise lustrous career.

So chapeaux!, then, to the Namibian performance in Bordeaux last night. They came with nothing, and they gave it everything. One of the shabbier aspects of the Rugby World Cup since its inception is how so much of the group stages have been about the strong crushing the weak. Namibia went into that game last night as lambs to the slaughter; instead of offering their necks, they claimed the cleaver and went for the butcher. Good for them – honour and glory have been legislated more or less out of the modern game of rugby, but Namibia showed that maybe the ancient virtues still have some role in William Webb Ellis’ game.

As for Ireland, well now. For all the rending of garments that will be going on in the media until Ireland face Georgia (native heath of Joseph Vissarionovich Djugashvili, aka Uncle Joe Stalin, incidentally) on Saturday, your faithful narrator can see exactly how the rest of this World Cup will pan out. Ireland will beat Georgia, even if Ronan O’Gara or Le Drique don’t play. Ireland will then go on to lose narrowly to France, still sore after the Argentine ambush, to set up a winner take it all game against Argentina, who have the Group win in their crosshairs and a blissfully sweet quarter-final against Scotland awaiting if they can get past Paddy.

The DVD and commemorative coffee-table books will record what happens next at the Parc des Princes, a venue where Ireland have never won in all their visits there. We’ll see footage of Paul O’Connell beating his chest, and Le Drique making a passionate speech about sure we’re good but WE COULD BE GREAT!, and Denis Leamy will throttle a small donkey, just for the thrill of it. Then it’ll be nip and tuck all the way, no quarter asked for or given, with Argentina leading by two points as the clock reaches eighty minutes. Then little Peter Stringer, in a diving pass from a crumbling scrum at the 22, whips it out to O’Gara who has slipped back into the pocket. O’Gara attempts the drop kick – he misshits, but it’s still wobbling, tumbling, bobbling for the posts – and it’s over! Ireland win! It’s Ireland’s greatest ever day at the Parc des Princes!

Of course, Argentina still go through, due to superior points scoring difference, but it’s been a great day for Ireland. A philosophical Eddie O’Sullivan, coyly flirting with Miriam O’Callaghan / Ryan Tubridy on TV while selling his World Cup Diary just in time for Christmas, philosophically remarks on what a legendary night that was, and how it all made up for the Namibian disappointment. The nation smiles along with the little feller, comfortable once more with our place in the world.

How does An Spailpín Fánach know? Because that’s exactly the sort of fools’ gold that’s been at the foot of the Irish rainbow for the past four years, that’s how.

Brent Pope was talking to Michael Corcoran on Morning Ireland this morning, and Popey was talking about how the iffy performances against Italy and Scotland were not just “training matches” after all. We can go further back than that.

Remember when Ireland were forty points down at half-time against the French in Paris last year and ran in a few tries in the second half against a French team whose minds were strictly on their post match pints of Châteauneuf-du-Pape? Remember how a twelve point hammering was presented as some sort of triumph?

Looking back at Ireland’s season this year, the only match result with any vague legitimacy or credibility was the win in Cardiff. The autumn internationals were a joke – South Africa’s performance yesterday against Samoa puts their display in Dublin in distressing perspective. Paddy Wallace was acclaimed as an international out-half when he can’t even play there for Ulster because he had a good game against the “Pacific Islands,” an “international team” that isn’t even at the World Cup, which means they’re not even as good as Portugal.

Ireland choked against France in Dublin and choked against Italy, where those two late tries cost them their first Championship in over twenty years. An abject display in Murrayfield was glossed over by the coach making a sensational accusation of attempted murder against a Scottish player whom he didn’t have the bottle to name.

As for the win over England, that generated so much blather and hot air and nonsense – that was Ireland’s fourth straight win against England. Beating England at rugby has been an annual event for the past four years. Celebrating that like it was some sort of achievement is like Kilkenny whooping about beating Wexford in hurling. It’s ridiculous.

Funnily enough, if the historians of Irish rugby have any interest in writing the true history of this golden generation, rather than repeating the pieties of a gullible public and a media-obsessed coach, they may find that the high water mark of this golden generation occurred a little before three o’clock in the old Lansdowne Road on March 31st, 2003, when England arrived to take on the Irish for a winner-takes-it-all Grand Slam decider, which remains as close as the Golden Generation has come to winning something worthwhile. But Martin Johnson, that giant of a man and of a rugby player, stood his ground before the game had even started, and he signalled to his men that day that England were not to be pushed around. Ireland got the signal too, and were blown out of it, 42-6. If you were picking a team to play rugby against the very demons of the hottest pit of Hell, Johnno is the man you’d have as captain, as he proved that day in Dublin, and again in leading England to the World Cup later that year. That England’s decline has occurred after the big man hung up his boots is no co-incidence.

As for Ireland, they’ve been content with moral victories since that high water mark, living in the comfort zone, like a team who have had a vision of the Eternal footman holding their coats, and snickering. Just like the Namibians were happy with their moral victory last night, so happy at being beaten by only fifteen points that they weren’t even annoyed at being screwed by the referee, and even had the dash to go for a tries when the sensible, professional thing would have been to kick for points. Somehow, the Irish moral victories of the past four years seem a little hollow compared to that.

Ciarán Fitzgerald remarked in the Setanta studio last night that there was no leadership from the senior players. Thing is, they’re all senior players. Rory Best, Andrew Trimble and Denis Leamy were the least capped players in the team last night, and they have fifty caps between them. That doesn’t make them innocents abroad.

Far more apposite is the image of the muck and blood-spattered Fitzy himself, eyes popping out of his head in passion and fury, asking the Irish lineout if they had any pride in the final minutes of Ireland against England in Dublin in 1985. Time to ask the same question of the golden generation, and their coach.





Technorati Tags: sport, rugby, Rugby World Cup, Ireland, Namibia

So. Farewell Then, Luciano Pavarotti

An Spailpín Fánach loves opera, even though he seldom listens to it and certainly doesn’t fully understand it. After having a good whine for myself recently about a certain cynicism existing in modern popular music, your constant quillsman has to tip his hat to the opera boys and girls. They might diva and divo left, right and centre, but once they get up on stage they don’t mail it in. It’s a very thrilling art form, and we are correct to mourn the passing of its most famous exponent in our times.

Luciano Pavarotti told a story about his father that sums up the remarkable power of opera. Luciano’s father, who could be counted on for a few bars of a song himself, loved Beniamino Gigli, the tenor who succeeded Caruso as the greatest singer in the world. Father and son would listen to the radio, listening to Gigli singing Puccini.

And then one day, Luciano had a revelation. He was at home from school and he heard Giuseppe Di Stefano singing. Luciano was totally bowled over by Di Stefano and, when his father came home, Luciano told the old man that he had heard a new voice, Di Stefano’s, which was even better than Maestro Gigli’s.

The old man belted him. “Never say again that there is anyone greater than Gigli!” he said. Luciano said it was the only time his father hit him.

Over a singer singing a song. Go figure.

An Spailpín’s ear is far too tin to say whether Pavarotti was the best and, to be honest, if you played me Pavarotti and Domingo back to back I wouldn’t know one from another. I find the discussions fascinating, however, such as this explanation from Tom Sutcliffe’s obituary in yesterday’s Guardian as to just why Pavarotti was the King of the High C’s:

"The point was that he sang the high Cs in full voice, though Donizetti had expected them to be sung in head voice. Full voice means without any adjustment towards falsetto or even modified falsetto, the sound when the soft palette is pressed down. Head voice would have meant not going into the passagio and sustaining that sort of modified shout, which is how tenors make their top notes exciting. But Pavarotti had a relaxed natural vibrato right through, so there was no need for him to mix in any kind of lightness or lack of body at the very top: his singing was all of a piece. This ability was a sort of piratical feat, and Decca (Pavarotti's recording company) used the title King of the High Cs on a record he made. The success and fame of this achievement for a time helpfully focused his work on the bel canto repertoire in which Bonynge and Sutherland were contemporary pioneers, with roles like Arturo in Bellini's I Puritani and Fernando in Donizetti's La Favorita."

Isn’t that marvellous? Any art that displays that breadth of insight and learning has to be taken seriously.

It is true, of course, that Pavarotti was a terrible man for playing to the galley. The more srón-in-airde set of the operatic world didn’t care for the Big Man, thinking him a hopeless and irredeemable ham with the hankie-waving and the constant recitals instead of appearing on stage in actual, you know, operas. But An Spailpín won’t hold that against him. The Big Man made a lot of people happy and, while duetting with the Spice Girls or Liza with a Z might be below the salt as far as certain folks are concerned, if it brought culture to the masses it’s alright with An Spailpín Fánach. And your correspondent has to confess that, while carefully researching this as I do all my little contributions, I laughed out loud when I discovered that not only did he sing with the the likes of the Spice Girls, the Big Man also teamed up with the one group of musicians almost as eager as himself to perform anything, anywhere at any time, as long as the money is right. Singing perhaps the only song every written about a tremendous feat of civil engineering, here’s Luciano and the Chieftains, by dad, none other, giving it socks on Funiculì, Funiculà. Maestri, take it away!







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Fuaimriain an tSamraidh agus Cruinneas na Gaeilge

Is breá leis an Spailpín tráchtáireacht Mhíchíl Uí Shé ar chluichí mionúir ar an dteilifís. Is cuid de fuaimriain a óige ag an Spailín, Ó Sé i bPáirc an Chrócaigh, Jimmy Magee suas ar a rothar in éineacht le Stiofán de Roiste ar Alp d'Huez, agus, ar ndóigh, an Muircheartach Gan Smal ar an raidió, agus na beithigh ag claí na páirce, ag breathnú isteacht ar an imirt.

Bhíos ag breathnú ar Thiobraid Árann agus Corcaigh ar an nDomhnach seo caite, agus Mícheál ag tráchtáil go beo bríomhar mar is gnách. Thugas faoi deara go mbíonn a Ghaeilge níos simplí aige ar an dteilifís ná mar a mbíonn sí ar Raidió na Gaeltachta - tá fios aige, is dócha, nach bhfuil an Ghaeilge ag an cuid is mó dá lucht eisteacht, agus tá sé ag iarraidh seans a thabairt dóibh blás agus taitneamh a bhaint ón gcluiche agus ón dtráchtáil Gaeilge. Agus go n-éirí leis má tá an ceart agam - sílim féin go mbaintear spaoí agus blás ón nGaeilge ag an lucht nach bhfuil sí aici. Éistigí le cuid bhur gcairde agus eolas acu ar nathanna mar "poc go h-ard agus ... POC GO CRUINN!" nó "immeal na cearnóige" nó "buailte amach i lár na páirce."

Ach mise ag éisteacht le Mícheál Dé Domhnaigh, thugas rud éigin faoi deara. Níl fios agam an stíl a áite dúchais é, nó imeartas focal pearsanta aige, nó cad é, ach deireann Mícheál de gnách "buailte isteach aige, An Spailpín Fánach," in ionad an leagan caighdeánach, "buailte isteach ag An Spailpín Fánach."

Nach ait é? Deirfeá nach rud tabhachtach é, ach bíonn sé suimiúl dom i gcónaí comh deacair atá sé dúinn tuiscint cad atá ceart agus cad atá mícheart sa Ghaeilge. Tá caighdeán "oifigiúl" foilsithe ag an Rialtas ó 1958, ach ní bhacann mórán leis - léim sliocht peile Dhara Uí Chinnéide gach uile seachtain i bhFoinse ach ní bhacann seisean leis an gcaighdeán dá laghad. Deirtear go dtaispéanann sin saibhreas na Gaeilge mar theanga beo fós, ach taispéantar freisin nach mbaineann an caighdeán leis na daoine agus an Ghaeilge beo fós ina mbéil acu.

Glacaim gur bhreá an rud é na h-imeartais focal seo a bheith ann, agus nach bhfuil an teanga i mbuidéal chloroform fós, ach ag am céanna, tugaim faoi deara nach maith an rud é, ceithre scór bhlian ó bunús an Stát, nach bhfuil fios againne cad é caighdeán Céad Teanga na Tíre. Nó sin an tuairim aige, An Spailpín Fánach.






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