It's weekends like this that are the reason why we love sports so much.
It has been some crazy 6 nations with every team throwing up surprises and every team beating other teams with the final weekend matching the madness perfectly. You get those tournaments where the form book goes straight out the window, the underdogs show up, the favorites stumble, and nothing's guaranteed until the final whistle. This year was exactly that kind of chaos, and the final round of matches delivered on every level.
I was out golfing myself and didn't get to see the Irish match but by all accounts it was a great performance that was well deserved against a strong Scottish challenge. Missing it in real time was frustrating, but the reports coming back were unanimous. It was the kind of dominant display that reminds you why international rugby matters. The Irish came with intent and executed.
To be in with any slight chance of winning the 6 nations we had to beat Scotland and get the points before England - France in the evening time. The math was straightforward but brutal. One slip-up and the tournament was gone. You need everything to fall your way when you're chasing it down in the final round.
The middle game was something of a non event as both teams were just playing for pride but nice to see Wales get the win as they played much better towards the end of the tournament. Wales had been searching for form all championship and finally found it when it mattered least—one of those bittersweet moments where a team shows what they're capable of just as the pressure's off.
Talk about playing for pride however and it was a magnificent performance from the English team. We all know that they have some very good players but for whatever reason it just hasn't been working this year. There's real quality in that squad—the talent's undeniable—but something's been off. Maybe it's confidence, maybe it's cohesion, but they've been underperforming relative to their potential.
All we could do was hope that they had some semblance of pride left in their bodies and could pull off a miracle result away to France that would sneak us the tournament. It was a long shot, the kind of scenario where you're almost afraid to believe it could happen. But that's sport, isn't it? You hold onto those slim hopes because stranger things have happened.
And for 78 wonderful minutes it looked like they might just do that. You could feel it building. The momentum was there, the execution was there, and for three-quarters of the match it genuinely looked possible. That's what made the ending so brutal.
I can honestly say that it's the first and probably last time in my life that I will see a full bar of Irish people cheering on an English team to win anything. It was surreal. The kind of moment that breaks all the usual tribal loyalties because the stakes shift. You want what you want, and in that moment, we all wanted England to pull it off.
I wasn't even annoyed when they didn't as France were the best team throughout the tournament and we had no real right to be crowned champions after the poor start. There's a difference between being gutted and being annoyed, and I was definitely the former. But rationally, France deserved it. They were the most consistent, most complete team across the five weeks. We'd given ourselves an outside chance with that Scotland win, but we hadn't earned the right to expect more than that.
It was however pure madness, totally engrossing and unreservedly must watch tv. I hadn't planned to stay and watch it but when i walked into the pub and saw the scoreline there was no way I could leave before the end. You can't manufacture that kind of tension—it either happens or it doesn't. Once I saw what was unfolding, staying became the only option.
It was a match that had everything and a tournament that had everything so much so that we all just enjoyed the result even if it wasn't the one that we had hoped for. That's the magic of a competition like this. When it's done right, when the drama delivers and the quality matches the stakes, the actual outcome becomes almost secondary. You're just grateful to have witnessed something that kept you on the edge of your seat from start to finish.