2009 Six Nations Championship their arrival at Dublin Airport. Brian O'Driscoll described 21 March as a “sweet, sweet day”. The game was watched by 945,000 people in Ireland, the highest rating television programme in the country by that stage of 2009. Former coach Eddie O'Sullivan was said to be "delighted" for the team. Brian O'Driscoll was named player of the tournament, beating Italy's Sergio Parisse and Ireland teammate Paul O'Connell. O'Connell was later named captain of the British and Irish Lions team to tour South Africa and containing fourteen members of the Grand Slam winning Irish team on 21 April 2009, describing it as
Grand Slam (rugby union) common again, as the number of Tests on each tour has again increased. The All Blacks' tours of 2005 and 2008 were originally planned to include only three Test matches; the late inclusion of matches against Wales and England respectively turned these into Grand Slam tours. Grand Slam (rugby union) In rugby union, a Grand Slam (Irish: "Caithréim Mhór". Welsh: "Y Gamp Lawn". French: "Grand Chelem") occurs when one team in the Six Nations Championship (or its Five Nations predecessor) manages to beat all the others during one year's competition. This has been achieved 39 times in total, for the