Yesterday mornings victory over the USA got us off the mark in pool C but failing to gain the bonus point for not scoring 4 tries and the lack of penetration in our attacking play has left a bad taste in most of the Irish Rugby Publics mouth. The lack of a bonus point wont matter unless we end up drawing with the Italians but in terms of knocking already brittle confidence levels it might have a big impact. The team and management urged us to believe that the performances we witnessed in August were only curtain raisers for the Tournament proper and “it would be all right on the night” once the real competition started. Unfortunately it’s very rare in top class sport and for sportspeople to be able to flick on and off a switch when they want to hit peak performance, which is why a run of good form and excellent training methods and habits are so sought after going into a big event.
Despite non stop reports coming back from New Zealand about how much fun the Irish Rugby Squad are having in Camp having spent the first week in the adventure center of the World Queenstown and how good the pre season went at Carton House if we are to judge the current health of the Squad then we must judge them on the performances in matches alone and over the 6 matches played over the past 6 weeks we have some serious issues that need to be solved this week or we may continue our appalling record at Rugby World Cups.
We have looked very predictable in our attacking formation and for even teams as limited as the USA its meat and drink to any side that is prepared to front up and make head on tackles. We don’t have the physical power of the South Africans or the Islander side’ s and we need to use our imagination and innate footballing ability to create and take try-scoring opportunities. Even with a scrum and lineout maul that had our opponent under immense pressure we made bad decisions in our opponents 22 time and time again and left without keeping the scoreboard ticking over. As Brent Pope said on the after match analysis, “you should never give a sucker an even break” and in my opinion we should have went for the jugular once it was obvious that we were able to win lineout ball virtually uncontested and could maul or push them over the line in the scrum. Had we done this and got the 4 try bonus point on board early the Americans heads would have dropped and we then could have started to throw the ball around with less anxiety and more confidence.
They say the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. We have only played to our potential in one game of our last 10 which was England in the Aviva in March and I feel that this week the Squad need to have a root and branch review of where they are heading over the next few weeks and how best to get there. We have found ourselves in a situation where we don’t know our first choice hooker, scrum half, outhalf or fullback yet. The most important position in any team is the outhalf and in Jonathon Sexton and Ronan O’Gara we have two world-class players. Both however are Alpha Males and are used to calling the shots for their provinces and the uncertainty is affecting Sextons game and the teams play. Ronan O Gara wrote in his autobiography of an argument he had with Eddie O Sullivan after an Ireland Match where David Humphreys replaced him with 20 minutes to go saying that if the coach didn’t trust his ability to finish the game then he would find it hard to believe he had the coach’s confidence and backing. I think that the time has come for Declan to back one horse and stick with him for the next few games. All the tournament favorites have a clear number one at outhalf. The management can’t solve the issues alone and neither can the players, everyone must come together in a similar process that the squad went through in the Famous Enfield camp preceding the Grand Slam win in 2009. The players are at the coalface and they know what will work or wont work in a test match and the coaches know how to set up the team best to exploit those opportunities. Small things like better communication between players and coaches or a small change in our style of play can make a huge impact on the squads confidence and belief which we badly need with the formidable test of Australia coming up and the Italians waiting in the long grass for us on the 2nd of October.
