An Irishman's Diary

ONE OF the most startling things I read in recent times was an interview with Christy Moore last year in the London-based Irish Post. The singer mentioned Ireland's current gloom, but also spoke of things that still inspired him here. At which point, the article said: ". . . Moore cites the recent success of the Irish rugby team as an example of that inspiration. A team he privately played for during this year's championship."

Ireland’s Grand Slam was still fresh in my memory as I read the last sentence. Even so, stunned by this bombshell, I struggled to remember which of the games Christy could have played in, privately or otherwise. From his physique, I guessed, he would have had to be a prop forward – blind-side probably. That would also explain how we hadn’t noticed him at the time.

Indeed, it’s a point of pride among men with cauliflower ears that what goes on in the front rows of rugby teams is a mystery to everyone else, including the referee. But that said, Christy still seemed to be getting on a bit for international rugby: unless it was just a cameo appearance – as a blood replacement, or a late substitute.

Could it be he who had replaced Jerry Flannery in the closing stages at Cardiff, disguised as Rory Best to avoid infringing any rules? No of course it couldn't. The penny dropped eventually: Christy had played for the team privately, all right – but only in a musical capacity. He went on to tell the Post: "To sit in a small room with the Ireland rugby squad is the stuff of boyhood dreams. I have loved rugby since my father took me to Lansdowne Road in 1955."

A year later, it appears, he has been playing for the team again. Indeed, he may have been appointed official supplier of ballads to Irish rugby, judging from Brian O'Driscoll's Twitter account this week. Here's the Irish captain tweeting on Monday: "We had a private gig from the legendary Christy Moore and Declan Sinnott in camp tonight. I was even allowed to butcher City of Chicago."

On balance, exciting an idea as it was, it’s a relief to know that the Planxty man is not packing down with the Irish scrum, and that the only damage his ears are suffering is from listening to Drico (and Tommy “What about her eyes?” Bowe) in concert. Yet even the thought of Christy Moore entertaining the national rugby team is, I must say, surprising.

His evident love of the game notwithstanding, he and Irish rugby seem an odd couple. They both have Prosperous backgrounds, it’s true: but in Christy’s case, that was just the Kildare village where he recorded an early album of the same name. And even if you can reconcile the IRFU with the lefty, anti-establishment tenor of Moore’s oeuvre, there is also his recorded views on the, er, constitutional issue: which would be equally at odds with Irish rugby’s neutral stance.

Not all the songs he sings are political, of course. With careful programming, the Revd Ian Paisley could probably enjoy an evening of Moore favourites: from The Cliffs of Dooneento Ride On(but not including McElhatton, which eulogises an Antrim poitín maker and was written by Bobby Sands). And no doubt when it comes to supplying the Irish rugby team, songs are as carefully chosen as dietary supplements.

I’m just saying that, despite the IRFU’s well-known commitment to music, which sees at least three tunes played before every home game, this seems like an uneasy relationship. And if it is, there may be some creative tension involved. In which case, I have an idea.

My suggestion is that Christy Moore could perhaps draw on this tension for song-writing purposes and, so doing, resolve once and for all the wretched Irish rugby anthem debate. Which, like a badly organised maul, gathers momentum in the letters pages and on sluggerotoole.com every so often, before going sideways or collapsing in on itself.

The problem is, as Southern contributors seem frequently to forget, that we need a song capable of being sung with equal fervour in Thomond Park and Ravenhill. Unlike Amhrán na bhFiann, which can only be sung with fervour in one of those places.

And unlike Ireland's Call, which can't be sung with fervour anywhere.

My own opinion is that the importance of anthems is exaggerated. A lusty rendition of God Save the Queendid not help England much in the recent showdown at Twickenham: which, incidentally, inverted national stereotypes. The plucky but outclassed English were passionate to a fault, throwing everything at O'Driscoll's cool and clinical outfit, which won the game with an efficiency bordering on the Germanic.

But if people want an Irish anthem that encapsulates the supposed national – or indeed supranational – spirit of the island, maybe the rugby-loving Christy is the man to write it.

If he managed this, it would be the the crowning achievement of a career stretching back so far that, when he first sang The Crack Was Ninety in the Isle of Man, "crack" was still spelt with a K (although 90 remains the highest recorded incidence of it anywhere, in either spelling). And not that his career will be ending any time soon, we hope. But there would also be a pleasant symmetry to it if he was the man to create an agreed anthem for Ireland's "away" games: four decades after his debut album, which was called Paddy on the Road.