Shaun Edwards rose early on Sunday morning, even though the Wales squad returned to their Vale of Glamorgan base from Twickenham only at 3.15am. The defence coach went to mass at a church a mile away and if he had not been aware of the impact of the victory over England on a nation in which rugby union is an alternative religion, he did not have to wait long.
“The priest came out and put up his hands in celebration,” Edwards said. “It is the first time I have ever seen that happen, and I was an altar boy until I was 21. That’s when you know you are making a difference to the nation. The team came through adversity.”
Just a bit. Already without a number of players, including the 2013 Lions Leigh Halfpenny and Jonathan Davies, Wales lost three backs in a four-minute spell at the start of the final quarter, and had to put a fly-half at full-back, a wing in the centre and a scrum-half on the wing. As Owen Farrell lined up a penalty to put England seven points ahead, the Wales captain, Sam Warburton, gathered his players and told them all was far from lost. “We’ve got them,” he said. “Look at them, they are blowing.” Within a couple of minutes, Wales were level through a try that was anti-Warrenball, moving England from one side to the other, exposing Brad Barritt on his outside as they had looked to do all night, and Lloyd Williams, the scrum-half pressed into duty on the left wing, found himself in space.
He drew the cover and kicked to the line diagonally for another scrum-half, Gareth Davies, who in the manner of an alert football centre-forward made sure he was onside before starting his run. Davies picked up the ball from his feet at speed – with the England full-back Mike Brown not in the right place – and scored under the posts.
The last scrum-half Wales turned into a left wing was Shane Williams, and he made a reasonable fist of it.
Brown’s head had been all over the place all night, the full-back even picking a fight with Warburton in the first half, and it was little surprise that he conceded the penalty that gave the Wales fly-half Dan Biggar the chance to win the match from just in front of the halfway line. Someone going on a journey has become a cliche among cliches, but Biggar has taken a longer trip than most.
He was an angry young man, easily wound up by crowds and always with something to say to referees. He once barked at Gavin Henson when Ospreys were at Newport Gwent Dragons on an evening when he showed he was far too easily distracted. Wales used to trust him only in their November international against a tier-two nation, but when he was left out of the 2011 World Cup squad, he sat down and asked himself why. If he did not like the answer, he did something about it and Saturday night was his apotheosis.
As Neil Jenkins, a bearer of water and advice at Twickenham, had done in another famous victory over England at Wembley in 1999, Biggar kept Wales in touch with his goalkicking even though they were being outplayed. More than that, his kicking out of hand, his chasing, his running with the ball in hand and his defending – his tackle on Chris Robshaw 18 minutes from time won the match for his side as much as his final penalty – showed how he had matured into one of his side’s most composed and influential players. The talk before the match centred on England’s choice at fly-half, but turned out to be a case of the Biggar the better.
Wales did not get away from Twickenham until after midnight because of drug-testing requirements. They had opted to return home because of the short turnaround to their next match, against Fiji on Thursday, and they wanted the players to go home for 24 hours. Their head coach, Warren Gatland, like Edwards not one given to emotion but who was visibly moved during the after-match media conference, stood up on the bus to utter a few words. “This is the best ever,” he said, reflecting on a victory against all the odds and more.
For Gatland, it had started with Wales at Twickenham in 2008 at the start of the Six Nations. They were 16-6 down at half-time then – Saturday’s scoreline after 39 minutes – wobbling but not falling over.
“There were points in the game last night when I thought the momentum was really going England’s way, but I just kept thinking back to 2008,” Edwards said. “I looked at Warren and he felt the same. We had a different group of players then [Alun Wyn Jones was the only surviving starter on either side], but we again stuck in there and again won the game in the final 10 minutes.”
The Wales players spent the summer training at altitude in Switzerland and in the searing heat of Qatar. They were pushed to their limits and beyond and, as defeat pointed its finger at them at Twickenham and the home crowd hollered, it was to those foreign places that they returned, plundering reserves this time they knew they had.
They still have it all to do with Fiji and Australia to come, but for now they have the pool of death by the throat, and a priest’s blessing.
