RUGBY IRELAND TOUR:THE FIRST thing that strikes you about the Irish team to play the Maoris on Friday (7.35pm local time, 8.35am Irish) is the replacements. Between them they assuredly provide a record of sorts. For when Seán Cronin sits down on the bench at the Rotarua International Stadium he'll be rubbing shoulders with a veritable cast of legends, all but one of them Lions.
If the going gets rough, as it’s likely to do against a fired-up Maori side boasting its sprinkling of All Blacks and likely lads, at least Declan Kidney will have some impact to call upon.
Indeed, albeit in a non-Test match, between them the replacements have comfortably more caps (441) than the first XV (269).
Geordan Murphy (67 caps) will captain an Irish side for the first time as one of only three half-centurions in the starting line-up, along with Shane Horgan (65) and Marcus Horan (66).
Even though Johne Murphy, Ed O’Donoghue, Rhys Ruddock and Chris Henry are the only uncapped players in the team, Marcus Horan, particularly, will be surrounded by a fairly callow pack, with the remainder boasting just four test starts between them.
As a proud son of Newbridge College who has played his career abroad, Murphy presented himself in typically easy-going fashion. But the irony of it could not have been lost on him, for he would never have imagined this honour being bestowed on him, least of all under the previous regime.
“It’s a huge honour, a massive one. It’s one I didn’t ever expect but I was asked the other day and I can’t imagine anything that would compare. Obviously playing for Ireland is fantastic and leading them out will be amazing.”
In his summer at Auckland Grammar School, when 17, Murphy recalled he had taken part in one or two hakas himself.
“When we were in school here and we were a little bit younger they teach the kids a haka and you have haka practice. So, yeah, I have been on the other side of it before. And then I’ve faced it a few times. I’ve had the great honour of playing with some quality All Blacks and I’ve seen it first-hand and it’s a magnificent thing.
“I think we’ll face it the same way Irish teams have always faced it. We’ll line up on the halfway line and we’ll respect it and enjoy it. I’m all in favour of it. It’s a great rugby tradition. Some people get too hung up on it but at the end of the day it’s a great rugby spectacle and the fans enjoy it.”
Murphy and the halves, Eoin Reddan and Jonathan Sexton, will all harbour designs on pressing their claims for inclusion against the Wallabies in Brisbane after each injected positives to last Saturday’s lost cause. So too will Horan, while the locks, O’Donoghue and Dan Tuohy, could be auditioning for the role to partner Donncha O’Callaghan on Saturday week. Ditto Henry, especially, and Niall Ronan.
“There’s a few opportunities for guys who haven’t had a run or maybe don’t have as many caps as others,” agreed Murphy.
“Everyone starts somewhere. Everyone needs those opportunities to put in a good performance and at the end of the day we’re pulling on Ireland jerseys. You need no more incentive for the guys. Everyone will be up for it. We’ve touched on how passionate the Maori guys will be. It’s up to us to bring a little bit of Irishness to it as well.”
Reviewing the video nasty of last Saturday was, Declan Kidney admitted, a painful experience.
“Yeah. These things happen in life. You know you’re looking at good players getting involved in things they probably wouldn’t usually be involved in and then you have a domino effect of events.
“You have a red card, yellow card, one of the tries during the yellow card, we had a man with a broken arm (John Muldoon) during a phase of play, another one I think Mick (O’Driscoll) tried to play through with a bad back.
“So, it was a domino effect the whole way through and the good thing is that the vast majority of it is within our own control and if that’s the case, then it behoves us to try and work on it.
“If you looked at the video and said ‘we can do nothing about that’ then you’d be in a really bad place but I believe 90 per cent of it is in our own control.”
The scars which have afflicted every member of the touring party are likely to linger a while longer but a win would be a timely short-term fillip before boarding the plane to Brisbane on Saturday for the last week of a 44-week season.
“Well, it would be nice,” admitted Kidney with deliberate understatement.
“I think any time you put on a green jersey you want to win the match, I think that’s always first and foremost. You can talk about good performances but you’d always prefer a bad performance and a win than a good performance and a loss. After the match last week you want to try and get a win under your belt as soon as possible but you have to work towards it, there’s no secret remedy, it’s a case of hard work and doing the basics right.”
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