RUGBY/2007 Six Nations fixtures: The IRB yesterday confirmed that Ireland's eagerly awaited switch to Croke Park in 2007 will begin with a Six Nations game at home to France on Sunday, February 11th, ensuring La Marseillaise will have the distinction of being the first foreign anthem to be played before a rugby match at GAA headquarters. Gerry Thornley, Rugby Correspondent, reports.
The game against the reigning RBS Six Nations champions will, undoubtedly, be one of the landmarks in the history of matches involving Ireland, dating back to the first of those, against England on February 15th in 1875.
It will, by some distance, attract the biggest attendance at a rugby match in this country, given Croke Park holds 82,300, as against the current 48,500 limit at Lansdowne Road.
Ireland's other Six Nations game, at home to England, has been fixed for Saturday, February 24th, and, significantly, is scheduled to kick off at 5.30pm. This is under the proviso that floodlights will by then have been erected at Croke Park, the game being the second leg of a triple header, at the behest of the BBC, on that pivotal day - labelled the first Super Saturday of two in the championship.
The GAA lodged their planning application in March for the erection of floodlights and if all goes to plan will have them in use for the first time in the second of the International Rules games against Australia in early November.
Though planning permission has yet to be granted, the GAA say they envisage no problems with the installation of lights before the Australian game on November 4th/5th.
"I think the way the stadium was designed it was left in such a way once planning permission for floodlights was given it could be installed fairly routinely," said GAA spokesman Feargal McGill.
"It wouldn't be the same as any major construction. A reference point would be (Austin Stack Park) Tralee and Parnell Park didn't face any problems with planning permission."
The GAA voted to open their doors to rugby and soccer at last year's annual congress, the association's Central Council then approved a proposal to enter negotiations with the IRFU and the FAI and a deal was agreed last January permitting Ireland's home rugby matches in 2007 to be played in Croke Park.
Despite the ongoing impasse between the IRFU and tenant club Wanderers and the 140-plus objections to planning permission by local residents, which look like delaying planning permission for the redevelopment of Lansdowne Road into an all-seater stadium holding 50,000, the Lansdowne Road Stadium Development Company is confident the redevelopment will begin on schedule early in 2008.
Ireland's home matches come in rounds two and three of the Six Nations next year and are sandwiched by an opening game away to Wales in the Millennium Stadium on Sunday, February 4th, before back-to-back away matches against Scotland in Murrayfield on March 10th and their concluding tie on St Patrick's Day in Rome against the Italians.
That will be the first match of a concluding triple header on March 17th - the second so-called Super Saturday - featuring France v Scotland and Wales v England.
The tournament kicks off in Rome when Italy host France on February 3rd, and on foot of the dates and times being confirmed yesterday, Jacques Laurans, Six Nations chairman, said, "Once again, the RBS Six Nations Championship has lived up to its reputation of the best annual rugby event in the world. The 2006 championship was truly exciting, bringing record television audiences and yet more unpredictable results.
"Scotland's return to form with victories over France and England at Murrayfield as well as Italy's first away point in Cardiff showed the traditional unpredictability of this great tournament. I look forward to an equally exciting 2007 championship with the truly historical occasion of the two matches being hosted by Ireland at Croke Park."
