Real value of recent tour will only become apparent in hindsight

ON RUGBY:Ireland should ideally have at least three players per position and, following the recent tour, they are closer to that goal than ever before, writes GERRY THORNLEY

WHEN IRELAND bridged a 61-year gap to win the Grand Slam just over a year ago, they did so with a brand of rugby that was clever, pragmatic and saw Irish rugby reach its holy grail. Of the six teams competing in the Six Nations, Ireland kicked the ball the most, and passed the least. They made a virtue of rolling with the punches for long stretches and then stealthily making the most of their forays upfield. It delivered in spades.

After years of relative underachievement for team Ireland, marked by Triple Crowns and a continuing succession of World Cup failures, that campaign ensured a golden generation would not retire with an empty feeling of underachievement.

Even so, the feeling also lurked then that this rugby probably wouldn’t be ambitious enough to make an impact at the World Cup and that the Slam might be the peak for a vintage crop. Little about the intervening 15 months or so have dispelled either view, while perhaps there’s also been evidence of second season syndrome.

On top of this, the IRB moved the goalposts. It wasn’t just the Heinrich Brussouws, David Pocock’s and Richie McCaws whose skill in enforcing turnovers was hindered by the edict decreeing that tacklers had to release ball-carriers. Across the backrow to the midfield of Gordon D’Arcy and Brian O’Driscoll, Ireland were almost peerless in forcing turnovers or slowing down possession.

This also afforded Ireland more time to reorganise their defensive line. Not so any more, and coupled with this was the edict re-enforcing the hindmost offside line, after Ireland had belatedly gone with the global trend under the new regime by placing an emphasis on quicker line speed, also encompassing ‘shooters’.

Pitched into the new ‘Super 14’ world of negligible contest at the breakdown when running into the All Blacks a fortnight ago, Ireland then suffered Jamie Heaslip’s red mist and Ronan O’Gara’s yellow peril. Cue nine tries and a record 66 points conceded in a Test match. This has probably been the biggest challenge of Les Kiss’s career as a coach, but it was noticeable how fewer Ireland committed to defensive rucks last Saturday and how quicker they were in realigning.

Also learning from the opening two games, easy quick throws were denied the Wallabies by Jonathan Sexton and the rest of the Irish kickers clearing the advertising hoarding as well as the touchlines.

Curiously, after scoring four tries against the All Blacks with 14 men, Ireland managed only one more on tour and rarely looked like scoring one against Australia. This was in part down to the lack of quick, quality set-piece ball and simply how the team wilted in the second-half last Saturday.

Yet Seán Cronin came on a ton, and Tony Buckley’s tour suggested belated fulfilling of his potential, though the jury is still out on his scrummaging, as it is on the locks and backrowers for whom opportunity knocked on this tour. There seems little reason why Denis Leamy won’t come back as strong as ever next season, and one hopes Paul O’Connell will too despite his debilitating groin injury.

There remains plenty of creativity and running amongst the Irish backs, but Ireland’s counterattacking is way behind the peleton.

Nothing particularly new there, but here Alan Gaffney and co are in a quandary. While the lack of urgency in working back is the primary cause of the problem, Geordan Murphy remains a better counterattacker than Rob Kearney, who remains defensively and physically more solid.

Counterattacking is ingrained in the New Zealand psyche, and the All Blacks provide the best example of this and much else. They have been a joy to watch. It helps that McCaw can just continually adapt to whatever laws apply, because there is so much ball-carrying, tackling and intelligence to his game. He could probably have played Test rugby at inside centre. High skills sets, executed at a high tempo are now key and it helps that the All Blacks also have clever nines (as do South Africa and Australia) and the peerless Dan Carter at ten.

Although England were the only ones to register a win against Tri Nations opposition, Ireland and Wales still look further down the road to developing the kind of game now required, whereas England still seem obsessed by the idea of running through people.

Wales are a little like Ireland, and Australia come to think of it, in that they need their four or five key players all fit and well.

Were that the case, we could all have fun trying to pick the Irish backline. Andrew Trimble’s rejuvenation has been a real boon, and bear in mind Luke Fitzgerald and Keith Earls will return to the equation, for as the latter two, Tommy Bowe, Kearney, Jamie Heaslip and others highlight, even the Slam was as much new generation as golden.

As the previous two tournaments ably demonstrate, approaching a World Cup with 15 ‘Untouchables’ is a non-runner, and seemingly even less so now given injuries.

After years of neglect when it came to building a squad, so it was that Declan Kidney and his coaches were either compelled or inclined to dip into Ireland’s reserves to unprecedented level, playing 40 players in ten games over the course of the season.

Given Ireland play Scotland, France (twice) and England in the August before the 2011 World Cup, casualties are inevitable and Ireland should ideally have at least three players per position, or alternatively a notional base of 45-plus.

They are a little closer to that now than ever before though it would help if the IRFU took a leaf out of the Australian manual (who are now adding on a fifth ‘Super’ franchise) and allowed Connacht to be competitive rather than use them to prop up the other three. Irish rugby is handicapping itself there.

Of course the primary purpose of the tour was to register an overdue Tri Nations scalp in the Southern Hemisphere. That’s how it was sold to us and it didn’t happen, and the All Blacks game will remain an embarrassment. It was very unlike a Kidney team to appear so tame, a Gert Smal pack so disorganised and a defence under Kiss which was caught so flat-footed. But one ventures nothing like it will ever happen again; perhaps these past few results have been a step back in order to take a couple forward. We shall see.