My introduction to international rugby
The story of my day when I went to Twickenham and saw England play rugby for the very first time.
I am not a rugby fan. Whenever I say that out loud I get the same look of disbelief mixed with pity because I often seem to be surrounded by scrum-heads, or whatever rugby fans call themselves.”. Invariably this is then followed by claims that it’s far better than football, which hasn’t once been followed by scoffing at how easily footballers go down “injured”. But no matter what they say, I just never got into it. I’ll watch the World Cup final if we’re in it, and might glance at the screen in a pub if it’s on and nothing else is being shown, but I just never got the appeal of something which is so shove and push and side to side. As an avid fan of Australian Rules Football I also never understood why they don’t just kick goals whenever they get into range - but, frankly, I don’t care enough to Google it. But some things are worth experiencing in person, even for someone like me, so when a friend asked if I fancied a trip to Twickenham, I said yes before he’d finished the sentence. I’ve no idea whether or not England are any good these days - every time I mentally make contact with the world of the Six Nations you can pretty much roll the dice and come out with a random order of who is unstoppable and who is utter garbage. Except for Scotland. Scotland are ALWAYS rubbish. It’s the one constant in a sport I barely understand. But England had apparently played Australia the week before and beat them convincingly, so I took that as a sign of things to come. We were playing Fiji, so I looked forward to a nice match where we’d basically have it all our own way and would only be frowned upon if we were winning by such a margin that showboating would become a thing. Clearly, I know nothing about both rugby and Fiji. Our day started with two sports I actually love - football and F1. My team (Spurs) were playing in an early kick off, so we met in a pub over in Liverpool Street to have a few beers and get our frustrations out of the way early. As it was, Spurs surprised us by getting a draw (conceding the equaliser in extra time, so at least they were on brand), so I was already in good spirits (and a few beers in) by the time we switched to the F1 to watch Lando Norris win the Brazilian Sprint race (with a little more beer consumed, of course). All of this put me in a great mood, so we jumped on tubes and trains from the heart of East London to its physical and spiritual opposite - West London. I grew up in the East, so everything west of Oxford Circus basically feels like a different world, a world where crime is white collar, where there are more trees than there are bin fires, and where the average weekly wage is more than my parents earned combined in a year. I appreciate that’s not entirely accurate, but the feeling of it being a different world was deeply ingrained, and getting off the train at Twickenham did nothing to change that false preconception. The stroll to the stadium was pleasant. That itself is a strange experience. Going to football games there’s always a buzz of excitement, a frisson of energy mixed with a hint of danger. Seeing Fiji fans openly and proudly walking the streets was wonderful and alien at the same time - there wasn’t even the hint that this would ever go down badly even with the most drunk or rowdy of fans. Local people were selling burgers and drinks from their front gardens and chatting with the fans, people were drinking small cans of gin and tonic, and everyone just seemed in a good mood. We grabbed a few walking cans to drink on the way along with an actually tasty burger, and meandered through beautiful streets until we turned a corner and found Twickenham looming in front of us. The stadium is huge - every bit as imposing and impressive as anything which is used for round-ball sports, and sits in amongst the houses as if that’s the most natural thing in the world. With so many teams moving their grounds away from city centres into cheaper, more spread out locations, this instantly made me love it. We were even able to buy a few beers outside the ground and then just take them in. Like, actual beers that weren’t bought on premises being allowed through the turnstiles - this was alien to me. Our seats were a little up in the gods, but this gave us a fantastic view of the entire proceedings. Seated around us were a group of Fiji fans, some guys who were obviously proper rugby fans and there for the game rather than the fun, and a group of women who had travelled from all over the country to meet up and enjoy the match together. Even for someone who’s been to the new Tottenham stadium many times, I have to admit that the pre-match hype was brilliant. As well as the relatively standard lights, music, fireworks and smoke, Twickenham also allows fans to download an app which helps create something I’d not seen in person before - all those who do it are asked to hold their phones in the air, and as it knows where each phone user is seated the app uses this to generate and run a pretty spectacular light show. Camera torches flash in time to deep, pounding music, flowing from one end of the ground to the other, and it really does bring a smile to even the most cynical of faces. Then the rugby began. As I said, I know next to nothing about rugby, so I have no idea at all whether what happened on the pit was a good or bad thing. I was reliably informed by friends watching at home that it was a tense, tight, intriguing tactical battle, and whilst England did come out on top it was by no means guaranteed. Fiji held England tight for most of the first half, though fell away in the second to lose to the hosts 38-18. That didn’t stop their fans enjoying it all, of course, and flags were flying throughout. I have to also admit that by this point I was more than a little merry. The novelty of drinking beer in the stands wasn’t one I intended to not make the most of, so we tag-teamed to make sure we always had at least half a beer in hand. The queues were almost non-existent, which was brilliant. Once the final whistle blew it was time to descend from the heights, which meant we took a spiral slope down from the clouds to the ground, joining around 80,000 people in walking away from the monolithic structure that is the home of England rugby. Unlike after football matches there was no tension at all, no worry that fans of the losing side would take out their frustrations on their rivals, or drunk idiots would scream the wrong thing at the wrong person. It was all just so, well, lovely. It didn’t make sense to try to cram our way back onto the trains, so we found a lovely local pub which somehow felt more crowded than the stadium had been and let the crowds disperse while we put the world to rights over several more drinks. Then it was no more than a train ride back into London at a remarkably civilised hour. Did I appreciate the match as much as a “proper” rugby fan would have? Of course not - hand on heart or with a gun to my head, I couldn’t name a single player or accurately describe a single passage of play. But did I enjoy it hugely? Absolutely - it was an amazing experience, and a superb way for me to witness international rugby for the very first time. Even though I might not go out of my way to book tickets again myself, I would 100% go again, especially if we were able to enjoy the match as the end point to another wonderfully pleasant day. So huge thanks to J for sorting out the tickets - as much as I’ll never end up a die-hard rugby fan, I’m really glad I got the chance to do this. If anyone reading this gets the chance to tick this off their own list then I can’t hesitate to say how much fun you’re going to have, even if - like me - you haven't got a clue what’s going on for most of it.