Two men, one town, and the Irish blood linking World Cup hopefuls

IF you’re the type who likes to plan ahead and you keep a diary, better circle Saturday, October 28, 2023. It could be a memorable day.

Yes, it’s in the middle of the Jazz Festival so it’s bound to be raining; and, yes, it’s a bank holiday weekend too.

But at 8pm that day, it’s also the Rugby World Cup Final, and - whisper it to avoid a jinx - this could be Ireland’s year.

Fresh off a Grand Slam, and seeded No.1 in the world, it would be no surprise to see the boys in green taking on hosts France in that final seven weeks today, if they avoid a quarter-final clash: For the victors, immortality awaits.

An Ireland v France final would also throw up a fascinating duel between two men who have much in common...

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Ireland coach Andy Farrell and France defence coach Shaun Edwards were born and bred a few streets apart in a town beside me in northern England, Wigan.

Both have strong Irish roots, both attended the same Roman Catholic school, albeit a decade apart, and both were part of the same all-conquering Wigan rugby league team before entering the world of rugby union coaching.

My home town of Warrington has a fierce sporting rivalry with Wigan - we call their rugby league players and fans pie-eaters. Not completely unconnectedly, its most famous for its giant Heinz factory - and of course its rugby.

I am spitting while writing this, but Wigan are probably the best rugby league club in England, and have long had a conveyer belt of players (and coaches) who are the envy of the world.

Think of the passion and intensity of Roy Keane and the dedication and skill of Christy Ring, and you have the Wigan template. Farrell and Edwards have those traits.

The comparison bears up when you consider the Irishness of so much of the north-west of England. Industrial, working class, family-orientated, work-hard-and-play hard is the mentality, one rooted in Celtic heritage.

Farrell, who stands on the brink of legend status as Ireland kick off their World Cup today, is proud of his roots.

“Everyone from the north-west of England is from Ireland,” he said in an interview in 2016. 

“You go from Liverpool straight across east Lancashire to Manchester and it’s full of Irish.

“I’ve got Dublin ancestry that goes back three or four generations, and so has my wife,” added Farrell, who wed the sister of a former Wigan rugby team-mate.

He echoed the sentiments of many when he said he felt more affinity with the Irish across the sea than with his fellow English folk in the south.

“The challenging move for us, and anyone else from Wigan, is to move down south (in England). Coming to Ireland and living in Dublin is almost like going home for me. Just the people and family-type atmosphere”.

Shaun Edwards may end up being Ireland’s nemesis in the World Cup - which will be ironic as he wears his Irishness even more overtly than Farrell.

He played rugby league for Ireland through his maternal grandmother Kitty Collins, and once said that Kitty’s father earned a ferocious reputation as a street brawler.

“My father told me he was a street fighter in Ireland. It was somewhere on the west coast, but a lot of years ago,” said Edwards, who was himself not afraid of mixing it as a player.

I saw him playing in the rugby league Challenge Cup final at Wembley in 1990, when his Wigan battered my beloved Warrington. Later, it emerged Edwards had suffered a horrific broken cheekbone and eye socket in the 10th minute - but he refused to come off as “I didn’t want Warrington to know they’d hurt me”.

The player who laid him out was later taken off injured himself, and Edwards said: “I wanted to tell him that he’d had to go off first, but couldn’t get the words out because my face had caved in.”

Despite his fierce reputation, Edwards’ roots go deep and he was an altar ‘boy’ up to the age of 21 at his local Catholic church!

“I was captain of Wigan and playing for Great Britain by then, but I had a lot of respect for our priest, so I couldn’t tell him I wanted to pack it in!” he said in an interview last weekend.

His uncle is still a priest in Wigan and Edwards says: “We went to Mass every week. Faith is very important to us.”

His pride in his roots shone through when he chose to turn out for Ireland rather than England, and made his debut at Tolka Park in 1999.

Afterwards, a journalist recalled seeing Edwards supping a Guinness at the bar, and the player went on to spend four days in Dublin! “I felt more and more Irish as that game went on,” he reflected wryly years later.

Edwards, who befriended Dublin boxer Steve Collins and his soccer manager brother Roddy down the years, also shares the Irish love for family.

When Wasps won their first Heineken Cup in 2004, Irish prop Peter Bracken was inspired by coach Edwards’ moving pre-match words.

“It was only one line but it just hit us like a thunderbolt,” he said. “‘Everything you do, you do for yourself and your family’. We knew where he was coming from. Jesus, it had such a powerful effect. He got quite emotional too.”

It will be some Paris match if Farrell and Edwards cross swords on October 28. Jot it down in your diary.

Paris is a fine big city, but it won’t be big enough the both of them.