A surprising 47,858 Irish people serve as company directors across the Irish Sea, just pipping Germans (47,724), Americans ( 37,386) and even French with 27,130, according to research commissioned by Irish-owned London-based PR firm Eulogy and carried out by consultancy Market Locations.

It means that many UK offices would have registered a noticeable rise in smugness following the recent rugby trouncing of England by Irish hands at Croke Park.

"As a company which operates in Ireland and Britain, we wanted to understand just how senior and influential Irish directors are in British businesses today, " says Adrian Brady the Irish man who started up Eulogy in 1996. "No to be self-congratulatory, but we think the results are something about which we can be proud."

The research also shows that Irish directors in the UK are also six years younger, and earn Euro7824 more than non-Irish directors with an average annual salary of Euro100,400.

Companies with Irish directors contribute �384bn to the British economy per year and employ over four million staff, according to the report.

Not surprisingly, London has the greatest proportion of Irish company directors in the UK, with 26% based in the capital. Manchester has the second-greatest amount, followed by Harrow, Birmingham, Luton and Edinburgh. The Scottish island of Orkney even has one Irishdirected company.

"The report looks at the generation of Irish directors who came to Britain because they had no other choice, but I believe that the Celtic Tiger Cubs will continue to shape Britain's businesses in the future; not because they have to, but because they can, " said Brady.