Ireland captain Peter O’Mahony will have no worries about his immediate future as he leads his side to a second consecutive Six Nations title. “I need to talk to my wife and family and think about it,” he said. “I won’t make any decisions over the next few days. It was one of the most special days of my career. If not the most.”
Andy Farrell was equally enthusiastic about the achievement after Ireland beat Scotland 17-13 to claim the title. “It was a proper test match,” he said.
“When we’re both competing for a trophy, that’s how it should be, isn’t it? Scotland will be proud of their performance, no doubt.
“In the end, we’re happy. It’s for us to win the title. It’s incredibly enjoyable because it’s so hard to do. Everyone talks about the Grand Slam constantly and is obsessed with it. It’s never happened before. Back-to-back Grand Slams. It’s obviously for good reason. For us to win back-to-back Six Nations titles, it’s a great feeling. It will go down in the history of Irish rugby.”
Finn Russell, one of Scotland’s co-captains, expressed a growing feeling that, at least in the northern hemisphere, this Irish team was special. “I think they’re probably the best in the world,” he said. “It’s the hardest place to win in rugby.”
It’s been a bittersweet Championship campaign for Scotland but Gregor Townsend believes his side are making progress despite another season of wild swings in fortunes.
“We’ve been arguing over the past few weeks and this has never been the case before,” he said. “If we can get a try against France we will be even better [denied by the TMO at the death in round two]. We have a chance to win every game. The three games we lost were all by less than a point.
“We felt we should have won against France. We didn’t play well against Italy, but today we performed well and we performed well in both wins. Two wins was not our intention and it was not We believe in what this team is capable of achieving. But today’s game was a good end in terms of performance, but we are still disappointed that we did not win.
“I think that’s the best defensive performance I’ve seen on our team, not just this season but the last two or three seasons. It was great to do that a few times in our Big 22. Yes, because that’s how Ireland usually scores.”
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Time and time again, this theme recurs: the Six Nations are more competitive than ever. The ever-changing narrative can bring unexpected twists and turns. Farrell believes last weekend’s defeat at Twickenham, which denied his side their first back-to-back Grand Slams in the Six Nations era, will only make them stronger.
“I think last week’s loss was the best thing for us as a team,” he said of England’s 23-22 win, which was sealed by Marcus Smith’s late goal. “Because some of these lads, subconsciously, they’re used to winning. But the great thing about the Six Nations is that it changes every week.
“Some guys are fighting for their lives. Some of the lads in this group are not used to losing. Sometimes they might go into a game thinking: ‘We’re doing this. “But you would never do that in the Six Nations.”
