Rugby World Cup Kicks Off in Times

Posted by
Mike Gerrard
Aug 12, 2007

I'll be both delighted and disappointed when the Rugby World Cup kicks off in France on September 7th. Is it really so close at last? France play Argentina in the opening match at the Stade de France in St-Denis, on the northern side of Paris. And the very next day England start their campaign to retain the trophy with what should be an easy match against the USA in Lens. On the same day New Zealand play Italy in Marseille, and Australia meet Japan in Lyon.

For me it will be the beginning of an exciting tournament, and not only because of the rugby. I've been involved with my wife in writing most of the Official Travel Guide to the Rugby World Cup, and she has taken most of the photos in the book. Once the book was out of the way, though, it was time to write pieces for newspapers and magazines, all of whom want to get in on the World Cup action one way or another.

So the excitement will be tinged with disappointment, as the whole huge enterprise which occupied so much of our lives finally comes to an end.

This week we received copies of the Ryanair inflight magazine, for which I'd written an article about Bordeaux, where the Ireland team will be based. My wife provided several photos for what was an interesting story – the involvement of the Irish 'Winegeese' in the Bordeaux wine trade. Not many people know that Irish emigrants were heavily involved in building up the wine business in Bordeaux, and became some of the most important people involved in the trade.

I love the way the Ryanair magazine's design team came up with a big graphic of a bunch of grapes, with one of the grapes cleverly turned into a rugby ball. It looked terrific. But we'd no time to admire that before the picture editor of The Times is on to us, looking for photos for another piece I'd written, to be featured in the Times' travel pages this Saturday, August 18th. That covers just three of the main cities: St-Etienne (Scotland's base), Nantes (where Wales and England both play) and Bordeaux (where Ireland have two matches.)

Can England do it? Well, not on present form, but I'll still be cheering them on, of course – and enjoying revisiting some of the towns and stadiums we toured last year when researching the book. Only on TV, though, as no – we didn't get any tickets!