A FIANNA FÁIL senator kicked off a row in the Seanad today as he sharply criticised the bid made by Ireland for the 2023 Rugby World Cup.
The IRFU bid was last month rated as the weakest of the three bidding nations across a range of criteria and despite last-minute lobbying of the voting members, Ireland were eliminated after the first round of voting with just eight votes.
The tournament was awarded to France.
Today, Senator Terry Leyden said that Ireland “made a bags of it” with regard to the bid and called those behind the bid “amateurs”.
Fine Gael Senator Neale Richmond interrupted to say that Leyden’s comment was “ridiculous” and he should retract it, but the Roscommon-East Galway representative stayed firm.
He said: “I wouldn’t lose the Scottish vote or the Welsh vote.
They wouldn’t negotiate a piss up in a brewery.
It remained tense between Richmond and Leyden, with the Richmond saying “you don’t know what you’re talking about”.
Leyden has got into hot water over sports matters in the past, when he said that he thought rugby was bad for women’s “health and well-being”. He later apologised for the remark.
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