In many respects, next Sunday is looking like twice the event and twice the challenge, on and off the pitch. Time was when Sunday games were seen as a TV-dictated disaster economically, deterring both home and travelling supporters alike, but this Sunday appears to be an exception, and one expert in the corporate/ticketing line of work anticipates the travelling English army will more than double its official allocation, which is technically just shy of 5,000.
Indeed, after the travelling French numbers were down from around the 9,000 mark to an estimated 6,000, he reckons there could be as many as 15,000 English fans in the Aviva Stadium come Sunday’s 3pm kick-off. Whatever about that there is plenty of empirical evidence to suggest there will be a huge English presence inside the ground as well as around town.
At least half the 50,000 tickets are sold through the clubs and although the English fixture especially prompted the IRFU to issue strict instructions to the clubs that their tickets were not to be sold on to away fans, demand has again exceeded supply considerably.
Inevitably therefore, thousands of tickets will have found their way into English hands as well as the revived corporate sector here at home. Unlike in recent times, the ring of corporate boxes will be sold out.
Bigger earner
The biennial
Six Nations
itinerary which has England and France coming to Dublin remains a much bigger earner for the Irish clubs than the even year when Wales, Scotland and Italy come calling. From the outset many clubs were selling on their tranche of tickets for an additional €100 on top of face value, despite a €5 increase across all ticket categories – including an expanded Category One.
One Leinster club reckons they will earn roughly €60,000 from this year's two games – more than twice what they would have made last year – through tickets sales and corporate packages.
Given the Union's latest, ill-conceived redrawing of the Ulster Bank League, which amongst other things will increase the number of expensive away games, you cannot blame hard-pressed clubs for cashing in on the opportunity.
The French did not travel in their usual numbers due to the economic difficulties there, on top of which many of them are most likely targeting the World Cup in England instead. One French tour operator, who specialises in rugby weekends, brought only 1,500 when normally he would have brought 3,500.
Not so English supporters, for whom the prospect of a World Cup on home soil has heightened their sense of anticipation and expectation, and with home games to come against Scotland and France, this weekend’s game is their last competitive away match of 2015.
The opening wins away to Wales and at home to Italy have heightened belief that, as in 2003, this year’s championship will serve as another Grand Slam en route to the World Cup, and certainly victory on Sunday would leave them odds-on favourites to claim that Grand Slam.
Asking price
In further contrast to France, not alone is there a buoyancy attached to the England rugby team, but their economy, especially in London and its surrounds, is booming, and sterling is strong against the euro.
Some Irish clubs who kept a few tickets back have been able to up their asking price, with one of them offering 20 tickets to a prospective buyer yesterday at €600 each.
Whether or not that price will be met is another matter, although in a separate case, an English tour operator contacted one potential Irish supplier yesterday inquiring as to the possibility of acquiring tickets for “lots” of fans travelling over this weekend.
Redeveloping Lansdowne Road into a 50,000 all-seater capacity stadium was always going to be stretched by the biennial game at home to England more than any other fixture, especially if it was a meeting between the tournament’s only two unbeaten sides after two rounds.
Clearly, this game could easily have filled Croke Park or, for that matter, the Aviva twice over.
To what extent Swing Low Sweet Chariot will be reverberating around the Aviva remains to be seen; the bookies make it a scratch game. Despite 16 injured players, England emerged from a 10-0 deficit on opening night in the Millennium Stadium with a deserved 21-16 win. They backed that up with a handsome home win over Italy. In some respects they have stumbled upon their current formula, but England have also played the best brand of rugby thus far.
They have real thinkers on the gain line. Owen Farrell has been the guiding light in England's last four successive wins over Ireland, and his mental strength and competitive zeal have rarely been better demonstrated than in the 12-6 win at the Aviva two seasons ago. He also has more experience than George Ford, but whereas he could be a little mechanical and one-paced, Ford is more of a natural footballer, has quicker hands and is more effective at picking a late pass, and therefore the more dangerous pass, to team-mates on the gain line.
It perhaps helps that he has a couple of Bath team-mates in Jonathan Joseph and Anthony Watson, and along with Ford, Joseph's footwork has also given the English midfield another dimension.
Greater effort
Having made the greater effort, travelling fans tend to be more colourful and boisterous than their home counterparts – witness the higher percentage of Irish fans who are generally bedecked in green when they venture to go abroad.
On the fairly safe presumption that they are all in gainful employment, if the travelling white army have thus excused themselves from work on Monday, unlike many of their hosts, then that is even more likely to be the case this weekend. gthornley@irishtimes.com
