James Corrigan: We'll beat the French, then we want you New Zealand

Welsh fans before the RWC 2011 Pool D match between Wales and Namibia at Stadium Taranaki in New Plymouth. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Opinion

James Corrigan points out the irony of the village idiots storming the Rugby World Cup's most revered town hall next Sunday.

An employee of this newspaper once referred to Wales as "the village idiots of world rugby". See, it's the little things that make us so desperate to see our captain hold aloft the trophy our support has always deserved. Yeah, the little things like being compared to retards and bumpkins.

Excuse the schadenfreude before the suffering, but many of us in Wales are thinking of the irony of the village idiot storming rugby's most revered town hall next Sunday. Just think of that daft-looking fool with the corn sticking out the side of his gob marching up and donning rugby's mayoral chains.

What would the columnist - that's you, Chris Rattue - have to say for himself then? Sorry, perchance? Who cares, we wouldn't be listening. There would be a mighty party taking place in Cardiff at the time.

We would celebrate harder than you Kiwis, for longer than you Kiwis, with more meaning than you Kiwis. You've won the World Cup before; we have only the occasional Grand Slam to show for our obsession. Believe it, the Welsh hold rugby as dear to their hearts every bit as New Zealand. It's just that we've long been crap. But therein lies the evidence itself. You try loving something which continually bites you on the arse.

By its very nature, our faith in rugby has been unconditional. In New Zealand it's always been a two-way relationship. For us it's been about as two-way as gravity. Sure, we've had the golden spells to cling on to: the Seventies, with Gareth, Barry, Phil and all. But we've resembled a preacher clinging on to his Bible as the walls crash around him. Oh, why do we believe? Oh why?

Here's why. We'll beat the French tomorrow easy enough and then, yes, we want New Zealand in the final. So what, we haven't defeated you lot since 1953 and the Breville wasn't invented then. Indeed, Warren Gatland wasn't even invented then. But stats don't mean a hill of daffodils when the pressure is all on the home side. You have to win, we just want to.

But say we did achieve the unthinkable; say fate did transport the Webb Ellis Cup to our fabled land of valleys and hymns. What would it mean? Apart from the biggest booze-up since Nazareth won the cup and Jesus tapped into the water supply.

I tell you what it would mean. Every last damn thing, in rugby terms. The belief would course through every club, every school class, every nursery. Children would start playing the game in numbers and with unshackled natural talent which would truly terrify the globe.

The economy would boom, or at least cease from going bust. The country's tourism profits would scale new heights and we would be what we long wished to be - the spiritual home of rugby. How would you like that? You would have no choice. It was always written.

William Webb Ellis invented the game when he picked up the ball in England and ran. But d'you know where that enlightened schoolboy was heading? That's right: to God's own pitches, to the land where there was a race of romantics who would run with him, refusing to kick, refusing to go down. To Wales, the home of the next world champions.

Chris Rattue, eat your heart out. And just remember: it's a wise man who plays the village idiot.