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23rd December 2016
07:05pm GMT

The interest in the Irish captain, the new hero, the Donegal legend couldn't be more sporadic.
Search terms for Sexton are more common and often and, although interest in Coleman peaks at the same heights, it doesn't do so as much.
Johnny Sexton v Shane Long
You take that same rugby player though and you pit him with an Ireland striker as opposed to a defender and the oval ball is dwarfed.
Jon Walters v CJ Stander
A battle between the country's favourite adopted sons.
Once again, even though Shane Long and searches for him on Google would show you the enormity of potential for Irish footballers, it is not widespread and it is definitely not year-round.
CJ Stander v Robbie Brady
Throw Stander against the man of the summer though and he doesn't have a chance.
Interest in Brady for a week in June was so high that the rest of the graph almost flat-lines - because no-one was coming back after the tournament. They rode the wave and then pissed off again.
Joe Schmidt v Martin O'Neill
Rugby wins. By a landslide.
Joe Schmidt v Roy Keane
Rugby doesn't even register.
Republic of Ireland v Irish Rugby
More people were searching for Irish Rugby on Google than they were for Republic of Ireland. Now, granted, football fans generally just use the term 'Ireland' but it's an interesting pattern to notice from January the whole way to December.
Euro 2016 v Six Nations
But a look at the respective sports' biggest tournaments and it'd show you how the interest peaked and troughed.
It doesn't matter, because if you compare any of those to Conor McGregor, you ask yourself what the hell's the point.

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