Over a century of sporting agony ends in Chicago

November 5, 2016 5:40 PM

After one hundred and eleven years, Ireland have finally beaten the New Zealand All Blacks, with a fantastic 40-29 win at Solider Field today. Ireland, who narrowly lost the last last time the two teams met, broke the current world champion All Black's 18 game winning streak.

Video highlights here. The two teams meet again in Dublin on November 19.

posted by inflatablekiwi (26 comments total)

Well done to Ireland - the better team won on the day for sure. I can't wait for the next game in Dublin to hopefully return us to the status quo :-). Hell of a first All Blacks game to take four year old little InflatableKiwi to though....not sure who melted down more, me or him....
posted by inflatablekiwi at 5:47 PM on November 5, 2016 [6 favorites]

I think losing to the Irish is maybe the best result - having the English break the streak would have been unbearable. And holy hell they'll remember that game for a long time.
posted by Sebmojo at 5:50 PM on November 5, 2016 [2 favorites]

New Zealand will just have to go cry their tears into the William Webb Ellis Cup.
posted by Talez at 5:58 PM on November 5, 2016 [5 favorites]

Wow, Chicago's the place to be for sports this week!
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 6:04 PM on November 5, 2016 [5 favorites]

Continuing the proud Irish tradition of having an even worse tale of woe than yours.
posted by Etrigan at 6:37 PM on November 5, 2016 [29 favorites]

Ok this explains the crazy traffic outside my apartment.
posted by jeff-o-matic at 7:05 PM on November 5, 2016 [1 favorite]

Yay for my second-favourite* team!!

(1 is the Wallabies, 2 is whoever's playing against NZ)
posted by pompomtom at 7:13 PM on November 5, 2016 [5 favorites]

For even more context, here's the list of national teams that have ever beaten New Zealand:
Wales, Australia, South Africa, England, France, and now Ireland. Prior to this game NZ's record v Ireland was played 28, won 27, drawn 1.

So it's a fantastic achievement, I still can't quite believe it. Even when Ireland led 30-8, I still thought the All Blacks would, as usual, turn around a victory. When Barrett scored and it was 33-29, the game was over - there was no way New Zealand could lose from there. Incredible work by the Irish to pick themselves up, regain the momentum, and win.

The 2016 scriptwriters really need to have a word with themselves, because this is getting ridiculous.
posted by Pink Frost at 9:39 PM on November 5, 2016 [8 favorites]

An interesting historical point is that the 111-year streak was older than the Irish state - the first time the teams played in 1905, (all) Ireland was still part of the UK.
posted by Azara at 1:51 AM on November 6, 2016 [4 favorites]

Not having a BT Sport subscription, I missed this. But since I woke up to this news this morning, I've been enjoying reading the NZ media reports. Chris Rattue, in particular, has been righteously angry.

Points to make:
1. Aaron Smith is no longer the best half back in world rugby, if indeed he ever was. His head's not in the game, he's been repeatedly exposed defensively around the fringes of the ruck, and when things don't go his way, he loses it. We saw this against Argentina in the Rugby Championship, and it apparently happened again last night in Chicago. I'll admit, I've been a Perenara partisan for a while now, but TJ just has more pace, urgency, class, and faster and less fussy distribution at the moment, coupled with an uncanny intuition for reading the game. Someone please send Smith a link to the upcoming lineup of classes at the Alliance Française. Thanks.

2. What's going to happen for the All Blacks now in midfield? OK, they've got the silky Lienert-Brown, but he's awfully young and defensively a bit naive and Fekitoa is just awful. A conundrum, but one I'm sure the selectors are working on.

3. Johnny Sexton. Johnny Sexton.

4. Who are Romano, Whitelock, and Retallick's successors at lock? I suspect we didn't see them in this game.

5. So: the inability of the NZ rugby management to line up a coaching assignment for Schmidt in Super Rugby this year. Oops.

6. Johnny Sexton.

That is all.
posted by Sonny Jim at 2:09 AM on November 6, 2016 [2 favorites]

There was an interesting example of the NZ sporting mindset, when Steve Hansen (AB coach) admitted that the best team had won, whereas when the Wallabies (Oz ream) lost against the ABs their coach went all bitter and twisted about it.

I suspect the All Blacks were 'persuaded' to lose by the Irish brewery industry.
posted by arzakh at 3:50 AM on November 6, 2016

I suspect the All Blacks were 'persuaded' to lose by the Irish brewery industry.

I follow them on Twitter and Facebook and from the looks of things they had a busy week on and off the pitch.
posted by tommasz at 4:03 AM on November 6, 2016

This still confirms my suspicion about rugby, there are two types of matches:

Ones where the All Blacks are playing and ones where they are not.
posted by mrzarquon at 4:12 AM on November 6, 2016 [1 favorite]

I'm still trying to figure out why Ireland and New Zealand were playing in Chicago, in November.
posted by raider at 6:25 AM on November 6, 2016 [2 favorites]

In a word: Revenue. Also it works as a first stop on the All Blacks tour through to Europe
posted by inflatablekiwi at 6:36 AM on November 6, 2016

Extended video highlights (22.45') here.
posted by Sonny Jim at 7:26 AM on November 6, 2016

> Johnny Sexton. Johnny Sexton.

Is this the rugby equivalent of "Bucky Fucking Dent"?
posted by languagehat at 8:12 AM on November 6, 2016

I'm still trying to figure out why Ireland and New Zealand were playing in Chicago, in November.

For the last few years there's been a concerted effort to raise the profile of rugby in the USA. Two years ago they brought the All Blacks over to play the US Eagles - which was even more hilariously one sided than I'd expected. (Score, 74-6.) I think the USA Rugby org knows the All Blacks are the marquee stars of the sport - people seem to know about them who don't know much else about rugby, (that includes me), so having them here draws attention.

All week there's been a video kiosk set up on Michigan Ave promoting the All Blacks, and then on Friday right along with the big Cubs parade they had a bigger demo area set up with All Black players signing autographs, and Maori haka performances.

I'm VERY excited to say I was there for this amazing match! A friend who's a big rugby fan brought a ton of friends to town for his birthday celebration and we all went. My first live match - I've only watched on TV before. Chicago's Soldier Field in November has a high potential of being a seriously gray, drizzly, blustery, miserable place to watch a sport, so I was ready to tough it out to make my friend happy, but instead it was a cloudless sunny sky, upper 60's weather, totally utterly amazing day. (Overheard in the stands: "The Cubs won the World Series, it's sunny in Chicago in November, that must mean Ireland's going to win." Said sardonically by an Irishman.)

I wish I'd known before the match that Ireland had never beaten the AB's before. I would have appreciated it a little differently. There were SO many Irish fans there, though, it was easy to get caught up in how excited they were. (I made a note to learn the words to "The Fields of Athenry" in case I ever get to see Ireland play again.)

Also they said it was the largest attendance at a rugby match in US history - 62,300 people.
posted by dnash at 8:17 AM on November 6, 2016 [8 favorites]

> Johnny Sexton. Johnny Sexton.

Is this the rugby equivalent of "Bucky Fucking Dent"?


Think of Ted Williams with a military pick.
posted by clavdivs at 8:59 AM on November 6, 2016

when the Wallabies (Oz ream) lost against the ABs their coach went all bitter and twisted about it.
That statement bears zero relationship to the facts. Cheika spent the first part of his presser complimenting the ABs before in response to questions discussing the shit NZ media.
posted by wilful at 1:26 PM on November 6, 2016

Anyway that was a great win by Ireland, well deserved, no luck involved. The ABs were really off the pace, looked like any other team.

If you want to see some other champagne rugby from the weekend, the first half in particular of the Wales v Wallabies game was awesome (maybe I'm a little biased).
posted by wilful at 2:39 PM on November 6, 2016

Johnny Sexton. Johnny Sexton.

Is this the rugby equivalent of "Bucky Fucking Dent"?

Maybe. I was trying to capture the note of excitement that Sexton's name seems to bring to the voices of Six Nations commentators. I've heard Six Nations commentary in three languages now, and it's always the same.

Now that I've managed to watch the entire game and not just highlights, I can see what an impact Sexton had on the match. The All Blacks were out-gunned in the forward pack for once, perhaps a little complacent, and A. Smith had an even worse game than after-match reports had led me to believe, but Sexton's control and crispness at 10 were certainly among the deciding factors. It was the archetypal Sexton match: he launched himself into every tackle, threw beautifully timed passes and went on little darting runs when he saw space in front of him, agonized over every kick, then went off injured in the second half in presumably excruciating pain. This is everything that we have come to expect from him and more.

You can get a sense of Sexton's heroically outsized ordinariness, his failure to fit the mould of the modern sporting professional, the toll the game takes on his body, and how much that missed penalty against the All Blacks in 2013 meant to him from this long interview in the Irish Independent. Just a total legend.
posted by Sonny Jim at 5:22 AM on November 7, 2016

Wow. I haven't been following the ABs this season at all, but by most accounts they are at their sporting peak, so well done Ireland. It's about time they lost a game, too. It's hard to get excited about watching a game when the outcome is a certainty.

Aaron Smith's name has been in the news a lot lately for his exploits off the field, so it would be no surprise to see him lose focus in-game.
posted by tracicle at 8:18 AM on November 7, 2016

A few more stats that put the scale of what Ireland accomplished in context.

1. Only the third team to ever put five tries in against the All Blacks, and only the fourth time its ever happened. Only South Africa and now Ireland have scored five tries against the All Blacks and won. Australia put in five tries but still lost in the epic Bledisloe Cup clash in 2000 - sometimes referred to as the greatest game ever played.

2. Only the fifth time a team has run up 40 or more points against the All Blacks. Only South Africa, France, and now Ireland have done that.

Yay for my second-favourite* team!!
(1 is the Wallabies, 2 is whoever's playing against NZ)

Funnily enough same thing here except swap the Wallabies and NZ in that sentence :-). Go Ireland on the 26th against your boys. Hopefully Ireland can continue the good run it has had against Australia in the last few years.
posted by inflatablekiwi at 10:03 AM on November 8, 2016

And normality returns with the All Blacks downing Ireland 21-9 in Dublin.....another great game. But the Springboks losing to Italy....yowser!!!
posted by inflatablekiwi at 6:55 PM on November 19, 2016

All Blacks a bit lucky there in Dublin. And how awful was Aaron Smith (again)?
posted by Sonny Jim at 8:22 AM on November 20, 2016