Even when Anthony Foley was a burgeoning young number eight with St Munchin's he could hardly have dreamed of a day like this. Leading out his country on his 50th cap at Twickenham, with Ireland then becoming the first side to beat the recently-crowned world champions.

It was, he admits, undoubtedly the high point of his career thus far. "Right now you're just trying to enjoy the moment and try and appreciate what you've done. It's kind of surreal to be honest. You go to bed dreaming about what could happen today, and for it to come true - apart from me intercepting a ball on the goal-line and running 80 metres to score - it's a great day."

All week Foley had been saying the pressure was on England, not on Ireland, and the purpose of the Irish effort was to ensure it remained that way; a point reinforced by Niall O'Donovan on the morning of the match.

"We had a little meeting in the hotel this morning, all the forwards, and just laid down the ground rules for the day - what we had to do and what he couldn't do. We just had to attack them all day in every facet.

"It was a quiet changing-room before the game, everybody concentrating on what roles had to be done. There was no banging heads off the wall. We knew that to beat England on their World Cup homecoming would be a massive prize for us. It took a lot of concentration and a lot of composure out there."

Indeed, composure was the key component in Foley's opinion. That said, he was having kittens like everybody else in the ground nearing the end. "That bloody clock, with the new rules, when it goes down to 40, but it seemed like it was stuck on 38 for about 10 minutes. It's something you try not to look at but obviously with the state of the game and one score in it, you needed to play out time. When Darce kicked it into touch, it was just elation."

So many of this team had been so close on so many occasions, as well as being around on the many bad days - not least the heavy defeats to England. None more so than Malcolm O'Kelly who, at 29, was deemed to be stepping down in favour of the up-and-coming Donncha O Callaghan, but he was the first to acknowledge that his resurgence must in part be attributed to the challenge laid down by the young Munster tyro before his injury.

"It definitely focuses the mind and I was so lucky to get in at the expense of Donncha, who must be looking on and feeling he should be involved in this. I was delighted to be involved and to play as good a game as I've ever played for Ireland," said the laid-back one with satisfaction, for he is by nature modest.

Now this team's most capped player, next time out he'll equal Willie John McBride's record of 63 caps.

"It's absolutely fantastic to be on the same parallel as someone like Willie John McBride, but I don't know if you can really make much of it because we play so many games nowadays. Great to have it anyway."

Rumours of his demise may be a little premature. World-class in the lineouts, O'Kelly also busted a gut around the paddock, never more so than with his try-saving tackle on Mark Regan. "I knew I had to hit him right. I could have slipped off him, he's a strong fella, but I hit him just right to take him out."

It was, he agreed, the best tackle of his life, rivalled only by a try-saving covering tackle on Ben Cohen in an under-21 international. "I thought I was getting too old to make those kind of tackles."

The theory might well be about that a pre-match deluge levelled, as well as muddied, the playing field, but Ronan O'Gara disagreed: "We weren't happy to see the rain. Gone are the days when we would have wanted those type of conditions. But we'd kind of seen, in fairness to the Italians, where to attack England, and that was out wide, but they didn't retain the ball. So our policy was to play from side to side and the try was very satisfying. It was an outstanding pass from Drico to Tyrone and then to put Girv away.

"But we'd identified that from video analysis, that Lewsey shoots up out of the line there, so I think we got it spot on. We practised all week to play with width."

Having landed all but three of about 100 practice kicks the day before, O'Gara apologised to his team-mates for his early miss against the post, when "not giving it the due respect", but thereafter "focused the mind" to land his next five.

O'Gara echoed Foley when attributing the win to a mental hardness this team has generated over the previous two years.

"We've identified it at team meetings. Some people mightn't like addressing that issue but there was a mental toughness about us today. There was an inner belief within all of us on the pitch." O'Gara reckoned this was "a more comfortable win" than the one over England in Dublin three years ago. "I think we did the people of Ireland a good turn. People at home will be proud of us. I heard The Fields Of Athenry a few times and that lifts everybody as well."