IF you were to look up the word ‘scamp’ in the dictionary, surely there’s a picture there of Eddie Jones.
He just has a scampish head on him. He can’t contain himself.
I had the good fortune to sit in a few of his press conferences when I was The Irish News rugby correspondent for a time, which basically involved going to Six Nations games and sitting alone in hotel lobbies because nobody really spoke to the outsider.
Jones always amused me. He could be extremely prickly but he loved press conferences. They were his opportunity to act the divil and sow seeds.
Before the Autumn Nations Cup in 2020, he likened the Irish team to “the United Nations”.
The previous week, Argentina’s Matias Moroni called them “the Irish Barbarians”.
At that time, eight of their 23-man matchday squad weren’t Irish. There were three South Africans, three New Zealanders, an Englishman and an Aussie.
Ireland could very conceivably win the World Cup this autumn, as long as World Rugby agrees to remove quarter-finals from the blueprint.
On Saturday they beat France to take a step towards another Grand Slam.
This time, the goys could potentially win it against England in Dublin on St Patrick’s weekend.
Again, four starters against France were non-Irish born, with Bundee Aki coming off the bench to make it five. That was without injured scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park, who would have made it six if he was fit.
It’s one thing if they’re coming here as young children to build a life as Irish citizens, but in the case of Lowe and Gibson-Park especially, these are just rugby players that happened to play in a country for three years, which is crazily enough to qualify to play international rugby for them.
The whole idea of international sport is a curious one for Irish people.
Most of our true international success has come from individual athletes.
We’re so wedded to the sense of patriotism and unity that team events provide, yet the soccer team’s use of the Granny Rule greatly weakens the argument that Italia ’90 and USA ’94 were truly great successes of the country’s ability.
At least those players generally had some Irish connection, unlike the James Lowes of the world.
The line between club rugby and international has been shattered.
Scotland’s resurgence is so farcically on the back of non-Scottish players. That’s not really Scotland, is it?
When he appeared on New Zealand rugby show The Breakdown, Eddie Jones hit the hosts with one of his best barbs.
He said that New Zealand had “three of the best rugby academies in the world - Fiji, Samoa and Tonga.”
You can’t really even call rugby an international sport any more, because so many of the players have no genetic ties to the countries they now represent.
Ireland are number one in the world, but it feels so hollow.
You’d worry that with transfers being allowed to happen within the GAA the way they are, that we’re diminishing the value we’ve always placed on identity, pride of place and success itself.
Shane Walsh is the obvious case in point. Not to labour the point but it remains relevant, he should never have been allowed to transfer to Kilmacud Crokes.
They went on to win an All-Ireland but the belly of it is cut out of it.
As this problem has argued previously, Walsh to Dublin is not the problem, but any outsider to a club of 5,000 members that had played in an All-Ireland club final last season as well is.
Recent weeks have seen speculation about various other transfers in the north swirling around. Most of the smoke seems to have a bit of fire rumbling underneath.
Jack McCarron’s transfer from Currin to Scotstown has caused rumbles of discontent in Monaghan.
The county’s by-laws appear to allow it based on his father Ray having played for Scotstown, and so Currin’s appeal is unlikely to prove fruitful.
“Naturally enough for a club of our size, there is devastation at potentially losing Jack who has been a wonderful player for us for 22 years,” said Currin club chairman John Connolly last month.
“And that devastation is not just in the club, it’s in the community.”
Transfers like that have always been part of the fabric. The Cloyne club crest contains a star to represent their native Christy Ring, but within that star there is a tear that mourns the fact that he left.
Cloyne were a junior outfit when he departed after a fallout. After a year out of hurling, he joined Glen Rovers and won a ball of medals. It remains controversial.
Eamon Fennell famously fought for four years to get leaving O’Toole’s and joining St Vincent’s, less than three miles away. He went on to win an All-Ireland club title in 2014.
People remember those things. In some ways it prevents a team from ever truly claiming greatness. Would St Vincent’s win that without Fennell, would Kilmacud without Walsh?
But aside from even the medals – which is often what is really being chased in these situations – there’s the blurring of identity.
There will always be players who feel themselves too big a fish in too small a pond. Those for whom identity is secondary to their singular pursuit of success.
The two mindsets often clash. A small club that can’t see any ambition beyond just keeping going against the key player who’s had a taste of something else and feels he’ll never get that again by staying put.
It’s tough. You only get one playing career and the better players are often wired with the streak of selfishness that made them what they are.
Seeing the bigger picture won’t help them gain their contentment. So it is hard.
But the integrity of playing where you were born has to be protected by the GAA and county boards. They have to take a firmer line on fellas moving short distances to big clubs, even if it is across county lines.
Otherwise we’ll become just as bad as the Irish rugby team.
