A day to remember as Caelan captains Ireland to easy victory

Caelan Doris admitted to being a little more nervous than usual on Sunday when he made history as the first Mayo man to captain the Ireland rugby team.

The Lacken native, a past pupil of Creevagh National School, needn’t have worried about his or his team’s performance however, as Ireland managed to hold Italy scoreless for the first time and win their second consecutive match in this year’s Six Nations Championship.

Doris, who began his career as a member of Ballina RFC’s under-7s mini rugby programme, became the 110th person to captain the Irish men’s team, deputising for the injured Peter O’Mahony.

He led by example, carrying 11 times, making nine tackles, and winning a turnover.

“I hope all the people who have been involved from Ballina the whole way to Blackrock take a little bit of pride from this and from seeing me captain the country today,” the 25-year-old said afterwards. He admitted to “leaning heavily” on the experience of teammates as well.

“I got to a point where I’m usually fairly calm on game day and looking forward to it but yeah, more nerves today for sure.”

Caelan Doris was also an underage footballer with Naomh Pádraig GAA Club, an amalgamation of Lacken, Ballycastle, Kilfian, and Killala.

Sunday’s game at a sold-out Aviva Stadium represented his 38th senior cap for Ireland who beat the Italians 36-0.

“His speech before the game was outstanding, to the point, emotional, direct,” said Ireland’s man-of-the-match James Lowe. “It was like he’s done it before and, fair play, he took it all in his stride and performed outstanding.”

Doris and his Ireland teammates will continue their search for back-to-back Grand Slams on February 24 against Wales.