Fully focused on the Italian job

Six Nations Championship: John O'Sullivan talks to Malcolm O'Kelly about the task facing Ireland this weekend against the Italians

There is an understandable tendency amongst Irish supporters to suggest that the annual contest with Italy in the Six Nations Championship will follow the lines of a well-thumbed script. The Italians will be fiery and physical but limited and, about the hour mark, their passion will diminish as tired legs and minds take over.

There is a curious parallel with Ireland of old: weather the storm and, once becalmed, their technical and tactical vulnerability will be exposed.

On Saturday at Lansdowne Road Ireland will enter the contest as overwhelming favourites as they bid to kick start this season's Championship in positive fashion.

Italy travel under former French "petit general" Pierre Berbizier, a new regime and a new voice to redirect Latin fortunes. This accepted wisdom holds little appeal for the Irish players, the intended recipients of the bumps and lumps. Talk to them about facing the Italians and the first sentence invariably alights upon the physicality.

Malcolm O'Kelly wins his 76th cap this weekend, the Irish Test-match record holder perfectly placed to offer a layman's guide to squaring up to Italy.

"The Italians are a very proud team. They play quite a forward orientated game. They maul their lineouts, the outhalf does a great deal of kicking and they will pick and go off the back of rucks.

"It requires (from an Irish perspective) wearing your heart on your sleeve as a pack. You do a lot of one-out tackling. They (the Italians) are looking for a break (in the defensive line) and then they'll attack further out. For us it's a mental task. It about the tight five to be very focused on not allowing any sort of breaches on the fringes and in doing that we would be confident we would have the backline to open up the Italians.

"In terms of the physicality you only need to look at statistics at the end of the game and compare stats with other games. You'd see that John Hayes made 10 tackles against Italy and only made three or four against New Zealand or something like that. It's a different type of contest. That's not to say that a front-five player wouldn't prefer that (the type of game you face against Italy). There's plenty of front-five players that would enjoy that type of game, certainly as you get older," he laughed.

At 31, O'Kelly recently signed a new two-year contract with the IRFU that will see him play until the end of the 2007/'08 season. It's a recognition of form, ability and his importance both to Leinster and Ireland. For his part the St Mary's College man couldn't be happier.

"I'm a devil for punishment," he smiles. "That's what I want to do and where I want to go. We had to work out a lot of things with the IRFU, straighten out some issues but I wasn't looking for anything insane in my book. That's why we came to such a (speedy) agreement. I wasn't looking to drag it out."

O'Kelly's is an affable subject, his measured drawl, beguiling as is his reputation over the years for being slightly scatterbrained or a touch eccentric off the pitch. His own assessment is that he's maturing slowly without being fully evolved since his days as a gangly, if gifted, Ireland under-21 international.

"I don't think I have changed very much, definitely not on the pitch," he says. "I'm probably more knowledgeable (on the pitch), probably more enthusiastic for training than I was back then. Generally I've probably wised up a little bit. One thing I developed, as I got older, is an improved relationship with coaches. The Leinster guys are great as is the Irish management and we work well together. I listen to them and they do to us in fairness. It's important that communication is a two-way street."

He's comfortable with the responsibility of being a senior figure, self deprecating with regard to the fact that his team-mates might not share that view. Having enjoyed Leinster's qualification for the Heineken European Cup quarter-finals he's happy to relegate it to the back of his mind, filed under "a nice little treat at the end of the season".

When it's ventured he could become the first Irish player to win 100 caps he modestly dictates that he won't be that fortunate. After a brief pause he muses: "Like I was always hoping to go to the World Cup but now I have a deal that'll take me to the end of the season. (My ambition) is to play as many games as I can for as long as I can."

Much done, much more to do.