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Later this month the Irish men’s cricket team will finally play against England in a Test match – the toughest and purest form of the game – at Lord’s in London.
The journey to get there has been arduous, but it is fitting that some of the players who have toiled for so long – as well as their supporters – will see Ireland compete over four days at the so-called ‘home of cricket.’

Growing up, I spent hours in the back garden pretending to be the world’s best player. In my day, that was Brian Lara, a flamboyant batsman who famously broke the world record for the highest-ever individual score in a Test match.

I got his autograph once, when the West Indies played Ireland in a 1995 challenge game at Castle Avenue in Clontarf. Instead of going on to grace the wicket as a player at that venue, however, I sadly only managed to attend a local junior disco – The Cricket – that was hosted there.

I would, however, have my own – albeit minuscule – role to play in Irish cricketing history. After college I worked in The Irish Times newsroom, where I regularly manned the ‘night town’ shift. This was the late reporting job, which often involved covering an evening press conference or event, or – if you were unlucky – a late-night crime scene. It usually finished around midnight.

The 2007 Cricket World Cup – played in a different time zone in the Caribbean – offered a welcome distraction at the latter end of such shifts, when much of the work involved helping to tweak a headline or root out a typo in between editions.

On March 15th, in their first-ever World Cup match, Ireland faced Zimbabwe in Jamaica. An Irish squad made up mostly of amateurs and part-timers – including a Johnston, two Mooneys, and two O’Briens – hoped to spring a surprise. Most observers did not expect them to.

On a dark evening in Dublin, though, we watched a gripping contest unfold at sunny Sabina Park in Kingston. Ireland competed fiercely but it looked like the more fancied Zimbabweans would prevail.

Image: Andrew White celebrates a wicket – White is today the Chair of National Men’s Selectors

There would be an incredible denouement, however, when Irish spinner Andrew White bowled the last over of the game. Like the final points in a Wimbledon tennis final, each one of the six balls he delivered became an event in itself – with the pressure gradually mounting.

Zimbabwe should have won, but with skill and determination Ireland forced a tie – a rare outcome in one-day cricket, and only the third such result at a World Cup.

“Their coach, Kevin Curran, looked shocked,” Ireland captain Trent Johnston later wrote in his book with Gerard Siggins, Raiders of the Caribbean. “His team had won it, lost it, won it, lost it, won it, won it, won it and finally tied.”

The chief sub-editor and I realised that this was something special. With millions watching across the globe, Ireland had upset the world order to claim a point. By no means familiar with the sport, the night editor nonetheless saw our side of the argument when we pleaded that this deserved extra recognition.

In what was a rare enough event, she decided to call the editor at her home. She, too, was convinced that a front-page photo would be appropriate.

And so the following day’s Irish Times featured a prominent picture of White, finger held aloft in celebration. Who knows, perhaps that image helped inspire the team two days later, when they eliminated Pakistan – population 197 million – from the tournament.

Hallowed Kerry scribe Con Houlihan described that Irish victory – which came on St. Patrick’s Day – as one of the greatest shocks in sport.

“There might be games almost as thrilling but my heart wouldn’t be so deeply involved,” he wrote. “If Kerry had been playing in the All Ireland Final, the tension couldn’t be more.”

A courageous and talented Irish team also stunned England at the 2011 World Cup, and many of them have since earned themselves professional contracts and Ireland the right to play Test cricket.

The sacrifices and dedication of everyone that made it so should be remembered when Ireland take the field at Lord’s. And, although rarely needing assistance in creating a cheerful atmosphere at a sporting event, Irish fans should find conditions there to their liking.

Lord’s, after all, is the only international cricket venue in the world where spectators can bring alcohol into the ground. According to the official site, the following are permitted: “(i) one bottle of wine or champagne (max. 750ml), or (ii) two cans/bottles of beer/cider (max. 500ml each), or (iii) two cans of premixed aperitifs (max. 330ml each).”

I’ll be bringing my own beer, and thinking of where it all began.

Mark Rodden, Journalist
Mark Rodden will be enjoying this moment and thinking about the journey that has come before
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