Tri-Noon!
By Mark H
March 19 2005
Falcons’ Jamie Noon became the first hat-trick scorer in the Calcutta Cup for 25 years today, in England’s 43-22 victory over Scotland at Twickenham.
It’s only the third English hat-trick in the 126 year history of the match, and Noon follows Cyril Lowe at Inverleith in 1914, and John Carleton at Murrayfield in the Grand Slam decider in 1980, making Noon the first Englishman to score a Calcutta Cup hat-trick in England. It takes Noon's total of tries in his ten England appearances to four, following a try in his second test against Canada back in 2001, and helped to win Noonie the RBS Man of the Match award. Looking ahead, it may well also have put him on the plane to New Zealand for the Lions tour. It could well have been four tries as well, but he was just beaten to the touchdown in the last minute. After the match, Jamie said when asked if he'd thought of scoring a hat-trick, "Never dreamed of it! But my son's here today, so it's the perfect end to it". Jamie's wife Rachel gave birth to Lewis Benjamin on 18th February. Congratulations to Jamie on what will no doubt be his proudest day in his rugby career to date.