Flying Ireland hitting giddy heights

RUGBY:THE GIDDINESS is infectious. Ireland advanced to their fifth quarter-final and in better condition than at any of the previous six World Cups, by completing a first unbeaten pool campaign with yesterday's handsome win over Italy in Dunedin.

Awaiting them in Wellington next Saturday, however, will be Wales (themselves easy 66-0 winners over Fiji), and like Ireland they are also a well coached team playing a potent brand of rugby and oozing confidence. In the century-plus pantheon of Irish-Welsh encounters, this looks like being epic.

Ireland’s forwards coach Gert Smal fulfilled the same role in South Africa’s World Cup-winning campaign four years ago, and last night maintained: “Nothing changes, we’re still the same, it’s game by game and you have to pick them off one by one now. You don’t worry about the other teams, they have to look after themselves. We just have to concentrate, see that we get our players fresh for this week and are well prepared for next week’s game against Wales.”

But there was even a hint of giddiness with the ice-cool Smal as well. “It’s energising. Moments like these, it was a high pressure game today. We knew that they were going to come out flying, especially that first 20 minutes. It’s a high pressure game, it’s like a drug. When it’s not there, there’s something missing but I think that’s why you play the game as a player or a coach. It’s for these moments, to show what you can do under pressure.”

Ireland had to be hard, direct, focused and composed to douse the Italian ardour, and save for one penalty by Mirco Bergamasco, Cian Healy, Rory Best, Mike Ross and the rest of the Irish pack largely subdued the much vaunted Italian scrum (much vaunted not least by themselves). Barnstorming games by man of the match Seán O’Brien and Stephen Ferris, forces of nature both, regularly put Ireland on the front foot, though in truth everybody contributed positively.

For their first rainless game, Ireland were actually under the Otago Stadium roof, but it meant that the Irish backs could also show their class, with Keith Earls’ brace augmenting a breakthrough try by Brian O’Driscoll, his 45th for his country in 116 Tests.

Everywhere there were positives, with Gordon D’Arcy and Rob Kearney playing themselves back into further good form with their best performances of the season. Declan Kidney was also utterly vindicated in his selection of the unfazed Conor Murray, all bristling energy and physicality, and the wise old owl Ronan O’Gara, who kept the scoreboard and Ireland ticking nicely.

Encouragingly, too, after replacing O’Gara, Jonathan Sexton nailed both his kicks, a penalty and a conversion from the touchline, to finish the game. Against Wales, Kidney and co may yet decide to recall Sexton. Ireland are in a very, very good place. Kidney is working his magic again.

The one sour note was the sight of a thoroughly abject Best, who had been playing the best rugby of his career, departing in the 53rd minute with what is a suspected broken collarbone.

“It’s a bit of a worry but we just have to wait for the proper assessment,” admitted forwards coach Gert Smal after the game. With Jerry Flannery already ruled out, it could leave Ireland very thin in the hooking department.

In an often ill-tempered match, with Italy’s Argentinian-influenced team not going down without a fight, Ireland kept their cool impressively too. It seems likely that the Italian captain, Leonardo Ghiraldini, will be cited for an incident in the 22nd minute after a scrum went down. The replays on the big screen clearly showed Ghiraldini appearing ‘to make contact with the eye or facial area’ as the saying goes. The crowd were almost as infuriated as Healy, whose start to the tournament had been delayed by an eye injury sustained against England.

Under the tournament rules, the Irish management had 12 hours from the full-time whistle to refer any incidents to the match commissioner, who himself has 36 hours within the full-time whistle to cite any player. There were a few other cheap shots, such as Sergio Parisse taking D’Arcy out off the ball with a shoulder charge, and in such a fractious game, it wouldn’t be surprising if other incidents caught the commissioner’s attention.

“There was a lot of provocation but we knew that we had to keep our discipline,” said Smal. “They’re a very emotional team and I think our guys coped quite well.”

Outside of their scrum, all Italy had to fall back on was a potent maul, but this was like the last song of a dying bird and they had no other weapons with which to hurt Ireland. But Ireland’s defensive line-out and maul defence needs work, as a slightly irate Smal readily conceded. “I think we stopped their mauls badly, so that’s one area we have to improve in and what we did was sit and wait for it. We sat well but we sat and waited instead of sat and counter-rucked and that gave them too much momentum, especially in the first half. The second half we put that right a little bit but we still sat too much.

“At least, I’m happy it’s happened now, winning a game, and at least going into the next couple of games that’s something we can fix.”

With Sam Warburton in mind, as Smal also accepted, they will also need to sharpen up their breakdown work again, à la the Australian game.

However an eventful weekend’s rugby, and even France’s latest World Cup implosion with an out-of-his-depth clown-like figure at the helm and the latest off-field late night shenanigans by English players in New Zealand, was overshadowed to some degree by the news that Dan Carter had been ruled out of the tournament. The most prolific points scorer in the history of Test rugby may well require surgery for the “torn adductor longus tendon” during kicking practice on Saturday.

In a land where the All Blacks are akin to royalty, and Dan the Man is king, this was the news that pretty much all four million Kiwis feared the most. Graham Henry described it as “devastating” for Carter, for whom this should have been the “pinnacle” of his career, and that they would have to play the cards they were dealt, and play them superbly.

To that end, though, Henry has called up Aaron Cruden. The word on the grapevine is that the foot injury which sidelined Richie McCaw from yesterday’s win over Canada may require an operation, which would suggest he is playing through pain. Most of all, though, the World Cup has lost the world’s best player.