Ireland now set free to enjoy Paris

Free at last. Amid all the emotions which the Irish squad and management would have felt in the aftermath of shredding and then rewriting the record book on Saturday, it's funny to think that relief would have been one of the uppermost ones. But there you have it, for now, at last, the pressure is off.

It's remarkable, maybe even a little ridiculous, to think that the coach's head, and by extension this team, were on the block. But the stunning 104-point, 11-try feast in the last two games ensures that Ireland can go to Paris not only with confidence but with the pressure for once passed over to the opposition.

"I want us to go out and enjoy that game," said Keith Wood yesterday. "Obviously nobody expects us to win, but we'll give it a big crack and see what happens. We can go out and play a game of rugby without a lot of the shackles and pressures we've had in the last couple of games but at the same time we'll still be looking for a level of performance."

Ireland go into this game in rude health, nursing only hangovers from Saturday's match and although France hope to have Abdel Benazzi and possibly Richard Dourthe back from injury, the likes of Fabien Galthie, Christophe Lamaison and Alain Penaud are still considered very doubtful. But potentially most damaging of all, their brilliant, game-breaking flanker Olivier Magne, who broke Scotland's resistance at Murrayfield on Saturday with his decisive brace of tries, is likely to be cited for an apparent head butt and thus could be suspended for Sunday week's game.

The incident was not spotted at the time, but was caught by BBC's reverse angle camera. This season's changed, and much improved disciplinary procedures in the Six Nations, have empowered a commissioner with sole responsibility for citing.

In this case, the citing commissioner is former Irish referee John West, who must decide whether there is a case within 48 hours of the game - ie, 2 p.m. this afternoon. If, in the likely event of Magne being cited, a separate, Six Nations-appointed disciplinary committee of non-involved countries would probably sit within a day or two.

By contrast, Ireland are expected to announce a squad of about 23 to be named on Wednesday prior to the team being finalised next week. The chance to place a statement of faith in the same team must be very tempting but the management have adopted a horses-forcourses policy in their selections heretofore and one imagines that Rob Henderson's case for a start has strengthened, while Trevor Brennan's physical presence may edge him back into the 22.

The only area of simmering discontent within the Irish set-up is the speculation surrounding the players' contractual positions, and particularly the unease that the vast majority are generally only of one year's duration. All bar three or four of Ireland's 100 or so professional players are out of contract in June.

Inevitably, there has been a new wave of offers from abroad, not just from English clubs but also French ones, being dangled at agents and players, the most high-profile and sizeable reputedly being London Irish's for Brian O'Driscoll.

IRFU officials maintain they will move hell and high water to keep their leading lights at home but if O'Driscoll is to be kept in Irish domestic rugby, it seems likely that he would then be the first case of a six-figure contract, and probably over four years at that. Although there's been speculation concerning Wood, the Irish captain is contracted to return to Harlequins next season and has always maintained that he would honour that agreement.

Wood confessed to feeling very nervous about the Italian game, and re-asserted that this wasn't a touch of old blarney. "At the first line-out my hands were still shaking. I had this great dread that we wouldn't perform. I had a huge fear that we wouldn't do ourselves justice. Everything had to be done at 100 miles an hour but still had to be controlled."

Both Donal Lenihan and Warren Gatland have re-asserted their belief that there was an over-reaction to the 50-18 Twickenham defeat, and perhaps by the same token there's a risk of overreacting to the successive record wins at home subsequently - though the manner of the performances have understandably delighted the supporters.

It's a two-way thing, of course. "The support from the crowd in the last couple of games has been very significant," admitted Gatland. "It provided motivation for the team and gave them a responsibility to perform. Had there been a half-empty Lansdowne Road against Italy I'm not sure there would have been quite the same intensity. The players really felt they had received a vote of confidence from the public, and they really wanted to go out and thank the genuine rugby people."

The upped tempo and advent of real pace out wide have been the most striking aspects of this team's evolution. Whatever the reasons for the improvement - the quality of opposition, the Gatland-Eddie O'Sullivan coaching ticket, the infusion of new young talent free of the old mental baggage - there's no doubting that a stronger dollop of the ol' Munster passion has strengthened the mix.

Yet how fickle it all is. Gatland must stay?