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Princes' World Cup bender



Prince Harry gluged vodka straight from the bottle as England's rugby stars partied to forget the disappointment of World Cup final defeat.

He and elder brother William also knocked back plenty of beer and bubbly during a six-hour bender which finally ended at 6am yesterday with sozzled Jonny Wilkinson stumbling out of a club under a blanket to avoid waiting photographers.

The wild night out included watching a sexy routine by pom-pom dancers with William and Harry joining in the hollering and whooping as the four girls performed.

At the height of the bash, at the L'Etoile nightclub in central Paris, replacement fly half Toby Flood poured vodka from the bottle into Harry's mouth.


And, as the revelry continued into the early hours, England man of the match Matthew Tait was cheered on as he discarded his shirt and stripped to the waist while dancing.

William, dubbed Prince Willy by the players, was also seen in deep conversation with Josh Lewsey and Wilkinson, at one point appearing to swap telephone numbers with the hero kicker.

Reports yesterday suggested Harry had rushed to Wilkinson's aide when he was sick in the club toilet.

He checked he was okay before blocking the door so no one else could see him. One party-goer said: "Jonny was out of it and Harry was his Prince Charming. He made sure no one saw him in such a sorry state." Earlier, there were wry smiles and laughs among the well-oiled group as they pointed out a sign on the door of the club, saying: "Excessive alcoholic drinks harm your health. Consume in moderation."

William told the Mirror he and Harry, who both watched the match live at the Stade de France, were helping to lift the morale in the camp after the heroic 15-6 loss to South Africa. He said: "It's such a shame. We should be proud. We can definitely win it next time."

The princes joined 15 of the England party, which included 2003 World Cup winning hero Lawrence Dallaglio and wife Anne, on the official bus from the players' headquarters in the leafy suburb of Neuilly to the club.

The players had arrived back at the Marriott Courtyard hotel just after midnight on Sunday morning to a champagne reception and a guard of honour by friends and family.

There were cheers too when the princes slid into the party, organised by squad officials, through a sidedoor.

As the players arrived back they hugged William and Harry who joined in as the champagne, beer and wine flowed. There were special embraces for Dallaglio and team-mate Mike Catt and their partners.

At one point, William put an arm around head coach Brian Ashton and offered words of sympathy.

He told him: "What a game. We gave it everything and couldn't have done more."

William then casually requested a waiter bring over vodka shots for him and his pals and three more rounds of spirits followed.

And when Dallaglio and Catt told the crowd it was time to go to the club, William said: "One more round for the road." A friend of the princes said: "William and Harry love their rugby and were gutted that England didn't win the World Cup.

"But they felt immensely proud of the team and also having the chance to have a few drinks at the end of the tournament. You could call it a royal seal of approval on the campaign." Yesterday, the hungover princes looked jaded in jeans and England tracksuit tops as they enjoyed a drink with the team back at the Marriott Courtyard.

They gathered around the TV to watch Lewis Hamilton's unsuccessful attempt to win the Formula One world championship.

Wilkinson only emerged from his room at 6pm to join them, shuffling through the hotel lobby in grey tracksuit bottoms and flipflops looking pale-faced and fragile, with his arm around girlfriend Shelly Jenkins. He spoke to Harry and they laughed and joked together as they tried to recall the night before. The princes then shared a joke with the families of Dallaglio and Andy Farrell and also chatted animatedly to team-mate Paul Sackey.

After the exertions of the night before, Harry began by drinking coke as he propped up the bar but soon moved on to a pint of lager followed by a glass of white wine. Pasty-looking William stuck to bottled water but did order a turkey club sandwich as he and his brother waited for a lift to the airport.

Jason Robinson, nicknamed after the speedy cartoon character Billy Whizz, also looked the worse for wear with his injured right arm still in a sling.

The dying minutes of the World Cup final were watched by 15.8million people on ITV. The whole match averaged a TV audience of 12.8million but that did not include legions of fans crowded into pubs. A screen at the O2 Arena in London drew a crowd of 5,000.

It took four hours to load seven weeks worth of England kit - from exercise bikes to hundreds of rugby balls - on to an articulated lorry at the team hotel yesterday. Phil Vickery and the lads lugged their own travel bags from their rooms.

Scores of England fans slept in the shadow of the Eiffel Tower after the game as all 75,000 hotel rooms in Paris were full. Meanwhile seven supporters dressed as medieval knights chose to stay awake all night drinking sambuca at the Gare du Nord railway station.
Mirror

Vickery's Paris pain
END OF THE WORLD ENGLAND 6 SOUTH AFRICA 15 ASHTON'S HEROES FEEL THE PAIN IN PARIS irb RUGBY WORLD 2007 FRANCE Vickery: It bloody hurts to come so far, get so close and not pick up the trophy.. no one remembers a finalist, only a champion




Phil Vickery last night revealed the personal pain he felt at captaining England to a World Cup Final - and losing.

Inside the team hotel, Princes William and Harry commiserated with players who had achieved hero status over the past month.

Outside, the Paris suburb of Neuillysur-Seine that had been home to the outgoing world champions for the past fortnight, began to return to normal.

But for Vickery it was too soon to draw a line under a campaign which has redefined the way we think of the England rugby team.


His body still felt the pain of a titanic tussle with South Africa which had stopped the world for 80 minutes on Saturday night and left him nursing neck damage.

But it was the hurt he felt within which was giving him the most discomfort as he prepared to fly home to be reunited with his two-year-old daughter Megan.

"To have come so far and to get so close and not to ultimately be able to pick up the trophy is a real stab in the heart," he said. "It bloody hurts, I can tell you. It would be wrong to say that everything we have done now counts for nothing but, ultimately, you're not going to be remembered for being a World Cup finalist.

"I wanted to be remembered as a double World Cup winning player. It wasn't to be and that's disappointing."

Brian Ashton tried to lift the mood of his loyal skipper by relating a conversation he had with Prime Minister Gordon Brown the previous night.

"I said I was very sorry we hadn't managed to get the ultimate prize and he said, from his point of view, it didn't really matter because the team had done the nation proud," said the England coach.

"I thanked him and then asked for a tax rebate - forgetting that he had changed his job."

Vickery cracked a smile at that and then endorsed the PM's view.

"I've read in the papers how proud people are at home," he said. "Well I'm bloody proud to be English as well.

"It's a privilege to be able to do what we do. My whole career playing for England has just meant everything to me. Having the opportunity to wear the country's jersey is just the most amazing feeling.

"Whether or not I'm good enough to be picked again I don't know. That is for the future. My focus now is to go home and see my daughter and see if she remembers her dad.

"I need to see if I can get a cuddle or a kiss because she won't talk to me on the phone."

The last act of England's improbable campaign had been for Ashton, the boss who presided over the team's metamorphosis from ugly bug to butterfly, to call his players into a huddle on the pitch.

"I told the players: 'You've nothing at all to regret because you've given everything over the last four months leading up to this tournament'," he said.

"I also said they ought to be incredibly proud of the way they had conducted themselves both on the field as players and off the field as people.

"This is a special group of people, not just rugby players. That's why they've got where they have."

With that Ashton signed off, leaving the last word of an extraordinary adventure to Vickery. "I just hope we've proven to not just supporters but to all those lads who want to push for an England place, that it's there, it can be achieved," he said.

"Let's stop knocking ourselves and saying how crap everything is in English rugby. We're not that bad.

"Let's be proud of what we do, get behind each other and get ready for the next World Cup."
Mirror