Bulking up for bigger challenges ahead

Whether it's the RDS or the Aviva Stadium, the Leinster outhalf knows a home draw for the knock-out stages brings a whole array of advantages, writes JOHNNY WATTERSON

IT MIGHT have been a seminal moment in 2000. A dummy runner cuts right for France against England in the Six Nations Championship, while French right wing Emile N’Tamack cuts left and takes on the ball. From the closing England defence a body comes out and hits N’Tamack, wrapping him, lifting him in the air and dumping him.

Perfectly legal, a white shirt lifts off the ground first. It is Jonny Wilkinson once more reinforcing an attitude to his body that borders on cavalier. The tackle closes play in the first half as England go on to win 15-9.

Jonathan Sexton remembers the sequence and has watched Wilkinson and New Zealand’s Dan Carter create a new kind of number 10, more equipped, robust and durable and with all the expected kicking, passing and running.

Sexton doesn’t set out to redefine physical limits as an outhalf but nor does he shy away from the idea. It simply isn’t an issue. But with Carter and Wilkinson, he saw how an outhalf could develop added value for a team.

It was his own decision to make it a non issue.

“Wilkinson set the bar. Didn’t he really?” says Sexton, who 18 months ago made the conscious decision to bulk up.

“He was the first to come on the scene and be physically able to live with the other guys. I remember the tackle on N’Tamack a few years ago. He kind of changed the whole scene. Then Daniel Carter . . .

“Jonny was his own worst enemy. But it was something I admired. His bravery in the tackle and the way he went into it. Obviously he’s pulled back a little now. He still has the odd one, where he goes in really hard. But he knows he’s no good to anyone if he gets injured. He’s better off on the pitch making tackles rather than trying to kill guys.”

A fighting weight of 92 kilos can be 30 kilos less than the player running towards him.

This week of all weeks, that is likely to be the case as Leinster groove for Friday night’s match in Paris against Racing Metro. Sexton accepts his job description makes him a target.

“Every outhalf is,” he says.

“We go into games and target the opposition outhalf. We’ll target him because we believe he’s a weakness and we’ll target him because we believe he’s the best player. It’s nothing new.”

He knows that Racing Metro is a bigger team than Leinster. He saw it when they played in Dublin.

He knows, too, that a home draw for the knock-out stages brings a whole array of advantages, especially to a kicker.

“They (Racing Metro) are the biggest side we’ve played against. Probably ever,” he says.

“When they came to the RDS we could not believe the size of them. They were even bigger than Clermont, who were huge.

“I don’t think there is any place for passengers any more. Even your playmakers have to be able to tackle and hit rucks. In years gone past you wouldn’t have had to. Now you have centres the size of backrows. You don’t have to be as big as them but you have to be able to tackle them.

“It’s something I’ve concentrated on only over the last couple of years. I never really took it seriously at school. It was something I never liked when I was younger and never thought it was important. It’s probably no coincidence that I started to push my way up the ranks.”

Home advantage means many things. It’s the preparation. Keeping your routine, your own bed. Away from home you might not have played in the ground. You might not have kicked there.

Home, the geography of the place, the climate, the crowd, the camber of the pitch, the back drop to the goal posts. All immeasurable.

“There’s a wind in the RDS and it’s a bloody hard place to kick in,” he says.

“At times it swirls and at other times it just blows in one direction. It takes a few games to get used to kicking there.

“If we played the game there it would be an advantage from that point of view. If we play in Aviva there is a smaller end that is different kicking into than the other end. Little stuff like that.

“But to go there (Paris) and get the home quarter-final is key for us for a number of reasons. To go further in the competition it’s a big advantage.”

The win over Saracens was magnificent and flawed. But Sexton knows that chasing the perfect performance is a fool’s errand. A performance over the entire 80 minutes might, however, be less impossibly aspirational and within the scope of Leinster.

If they hit that height, Sexton’s view is it would be a first this season.

“We played well in bursts,” he says.

“You are never going to have a game where it is all good. The other team is going to have a purple patch at some stage. An 80-minute performance . . . we still haven’t produced one.”

Not at all, at any time this season?

“Not 80 minutes, no. I don’t think so.”

Sexton will blanche at any comparisons to Wilkinson. But there is a perfectionist in him.

For the sake of rugby he’ll drink his Maxi-Muscle protein. He’ll salt away his video information. He’ll face down the big guys in Paris. But only a win will allow him sleep.

“You look at things you could have done better and then go out and try to play the perfect game,” he says.

“Then you’ll make different mistakes the next day. That’s the challenge.”