“Almost 20 years ago, John Major, the British Conservative prime minister, gave a speech that was cringe-inducingly nostalgic, even by Tory standards.
“ ‘Fifty years on from now,’ he said, ‘Britain will still be the country of long shadows on cricket grounds, warm beer, invincible green suburbs, dog lovers and pools fillers and, as George Orwell said, “Old maids bicycling to holy communion through the morning mist” and, if we get our way, Shakespeare will still be read even in school’.
“Today, somewhere in one of those invincible green suburbs, John Major is crying in his warm beer, tempted to knock some old lady off her bicycle and kick both the dog and the pool filler, having witnessed the positively Orwellian sight of Ireland beating England.
“In cricket!”
– Kevin Cullen in the Boston Globe
" Over the years, England's national sports teams have been on the wrong end of some infamous defeats. Until yesterday, America's 1-0 victory in the football World Cup of 1950 was probably the most notorious. But the extraordinary triumph of Ireland's cricketers in their World Cup group match in Bangalore must rank alongside any sporting upset of yore . . . Ireland showed emphatically that they deserve to play with the big boys."
– Daily Telegraph editorial
" At first he merely chanced his arm . . . he just wanted to bring some entertainment to the crowd . . . Some of them were agricultural heaves in truth (but so what), some of them contained a dollop of great good fortune, but many of them were shots of power and class as well. It takes a good player, with sound technique, to hit a cover drive for six off a fast bowler."
– Former England captain Mike Atherton, in the Times, commends Kevin O'Brien's record-breaking innings.
“For months, talk in Ireland has been of nothing but bank bailouts and politics, but the unlikely sport of cricket finally knocked those off the top news spot.
“It was a piece of rare good news in Ireland, whose voters last week kicked out the government over its handling of the economy.
“Even prime-minister-in- waiting Enda Kenny, who has largely shunned the media limelight in recent days while coalition talks continue, broke cover to congratulate the team.”
– The Times of India
“The ruling ICC has concluded that the ‘associate’ nations, those who do not play Test cricket and make up the numbers every four years when the World Cup comes round, present too much of an arduous organisational challenge for the tournament. They create a cluttering effect. As competitive fodder goes, they are maybe not worth the trouble.
“In Bangalore yesterday Kevin O’Brien did for the theory pretty much as he disposed of the English bowling. Whatever happens in the long weeks ahead, he made this World Cup quite unforgettable. He unearthed the best of any sport.”
– James Lawton in the Independent
“It was fitting that Mooney scored the winning run against England. He is a much-needed symbol of redemption in a country that has gone so quickly from boom to bust. He went from the dole queue to the history books, the man who was at bat when mighty England fell.
“Poor England. Before World War II, the British empire counted 800 million subjects. Now all the colonies are gone. Worse, now all the colonies can beat England in cricket. India and Pakistan are cricket powers. The Aussies hold a 123-100 lead in the Australia-England competition known as The Ashes.
“And now, nightmare of nightmares, Ireland.
“Ashes, indeed.
– Kevin Cullen continues to twist the knife in the Globe.
“That was simply unbelievable. There was no luck involved.
“O’Brien simply took them from the brink of defeat to probably the greatest triumph in their cricketing history with a world-class display of proper, clean, one-day hitting.”
– Former England captain Nassar Hussain in the Daily Mail
GAVIN CUMMISKEY
