RUGBY:IT'S BEEN a painful lesson, and you wonder did it have to be inflicted so sorely.
Acclimatising to the changed laws down south, one of the primary purposes of bringing virtually anyone still standing at the end of the domestic season, has shown that ruck ball is quicker and the game now rewards teams who keep possession and counter rather than kick the ball.
In the lengthy post-mortem to Saturday’s thumping 66-28 defeat, concluding in yesterday’s team meeting, that much has been made abundantly clear, revealed backs coach Alan Gaffney yesterday.
“With 14 men we decided to have a crack and we were pretty good in the second half,” said Gaffney from the team’s base in Rotorua. “I think we now have more of an understanding that we do have to keep the ball in hand and we do have to attack the sides more. We haven’t gone from being a very good side to being a poor side overnight.
“We’ve just got to understand the fact that we are a good side and back ourselves accordingly.
“Today we’ve agreed that that’s what we’ve got to go and do. The new interpretations allow us to play and allow us to control the ball and play it at pace. Once we become accustomed to that, I think we’re going to become quite a force to be reckoned with.”
There is also a defiant belief that the game turned on small margins and that credit for scoring four tries with 14 men cannot entirely be attributed to the All Blacks taking their foot off the pedal.
It also didn’t help Ireland’s cause that they effectively played last Saturday’s game with the equivalent of seven and a half yellow cards. But there was also an acknowledgement that they panicked when down to 13 men, not least when twice kicking the ball downfield rather than retaining it or finding row Z.
“You’ve always got to pay the opposition respect but you don’t have to pay them undue respect, which I think is what we did in the first half,” Gaffney conceded, “even down to 13 men, we still had the ability to control the ball at that period in time. We chatted with the boys about it this morning. We panicked a bit.”
For the senior players in the squad, such as Marcus Horan, there is a responsibility to lift the squad for the challenges ahead.
“You always want to get your first win on the road. It’s tough mentally for guys to get back and get the heads right but we’ve had a meeting there this morning and lads are keen to just get back on the pitch and put things right. The few of us that weren’t involved maybe need to drive that on and build the enthusiasm.”
A tired Rhys Ruddock arrived from captaining the Irish Under-20 World Cup team in Argentina (a 15-hour time difference) via a 15-hour flight from Buenos Aires to Auckland, where he had a five-hour wait.
Straight in to afternoon training, his impending start on Friday against the Maoris, after just three starts for Leinster, is a bold move and demonstrates how highly regarded he is by the Irish management.
“I think he’s an exceptional player,” said Gaffney. “He’s only played so many games in the Magners League but the ones he has played he’s shown a nice skill level and a high level of intensity.”
“He’s probably got that from his father,” Gaffney added, in reference to the former Leinster and Welsh coach Mike Ruddock. “He’s a tough boy, a very, very skilful boy and has got all the attributes to make it in the professional game and at the highest level.”
Ruddock’s call-up comes after Jamie Heaslip and John Muldoon have joined Stephen Ferris, Denis Leamy, Kevin McLaughlin and Seán O’Brien amongst the backrow absentees.
The decision not to also call-up Alan Quinlan and/or Neil Best would appear to show how much they have fallen out of favour.
Quinlan hasn’t been involved since the 22-3 defeat to the All Blacks in November 2008, after which he was cited and suspended for three weeks for stamping on Rodney So’oialo.
“Both of them have been around the block a number of times, Quinny more than Besty,” said Gaffney. “We looked to the future and the decision was to give young Ruddock a chance.”
Heaslip has returned home but was not accompanied by the desperately unfortunate Muldoon, who may have to remain on until at least Friday to see the specialist who carried out the operation on his fractured wrist in an Auckland hospital yesterday.
Gordon D’Arcy sustained the same injury in February ’08, and it effectively sidelined him for a year. It is to be sincerely hoped Muldoon doesn’t suffer the same complications. The Connacht skipper is expected to be sidelined for at least three or four months.
Mick O’Driscoll (back spasm), Shane Jennings (ankle) and John Hayes (virus) are all still incapacitated, as is Damien Varley, who sustained a back spasm while on duty for the New Zealand Barbarians against the Maoris last Saturday in Whangarei in the warm-up. Andrew Trimble has an abductor strain but he is expected to be fit to face Australia.
The Maoris have lost first-choice scrumhalf Chris Smylie, who suffered a fractured cheekbone in their last-ditch 37-31 win over the NZ Baabaas, but Gaffney was “expecting a very, very strong team. You look at their backs, (Stephen) Brett, (Luke) McAllister and forwards Latimer, Isaac Ross, Corey Flynn etc. There’s a lot of players who recently represented the All Blacks so it’s not as though they are guys put out to pasture. And mixing them with a lot of young boys will make it a very difficult game on the weekend. And it’s good because we’ll have the same mix-up.”
The management are committed to giving everyone in the squad a game, unlike the three-match tour to New Zealand and Australia four years ago, when only 16 of the 30-man squad started, and eight didn’t see one minute’s action.
Hence, the team for Friday is expected to read something like this: Geordan Murphy; Horgan, Duffy, Wallace, Johne Murphy; Sexton, Stringer; Horan, Fogarty, Court; Tuohy, E O’Donoghue; R Ruddock, N Ronan, C Henry.
