RUGBY - TOMMY BOWE

The 2010 Texaco Sportstar for Rugby, Tommy Bowe, would not have been the most popular man in the RDS on May 29th of this year. Well, not with Leinster supporters. Playing for the Ospreys in the Magners League final, he crashed over the line in the 17th minute to give the Welsh team a lead they would never relinquish. And so a much anticipated day of glory for the odds-on favourites - with Michael Cheika and Malcolm O’Kelly bowing out at the conclusion of the game – turned into a wake in the watering holes close to Ballsbridge. For the former Monaghan minor footballer, the 2009-10 season was dream-like, illustrated by the fact that he scooped the Players’ Player of the Year award in Wales, the equivalent in Ireland for the second time and then the Six Nations Championship Player of the Tournament, a remarkable hat-trick. At the inaugural Magners League Awards ceremony in the Millennium Stadium he added to his honours when receiving the players’ player award. His scoring record for the season clearly illustrates why rugby judges hold him in such high esteem. Last season he touched down 20 times in 32 matches, all but one in the starting team for club or country, 15 for Ospreys (eight in the Magners League, seven in the Heineken Cup) as well as five for Ireland. No doubt the dismay in Dublin in May will be replaced with joyous celebrations when he wears the green jersey in this season’s Six Nations Championship - and later, the World Cup.