Greg Feek wants Irish pack to hit back

They even think and talk like him now. Any chance of this Irish squad becoming contented or happy with themselves, even in the fallout of beating the number-two side in the world, are remote in the extreme

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No doubt echoing Joe Schmidt, scrum coach Greg Feek revealed that he and the Irish forwards regard the Georgian game as a chance to put last Saturday's wrongs to rights.

Following on Rob Kearney's assertion that South Africa played poorly, Feek revealed that the forwards struggled to fully savour the win because of their difficulties at scrum time, where they lost two of their six put-ins and were perhaps grateful that the Springboks only had three scrums of their own.

“Last week’s victory, there is a lot of euphoria around about it but there was a real bittersweet feeling in the changing-room, particularly from numbers one to eight and the guys that replaced them,” Feek revealed yesterday at the squad’s Carton House base.

"We thought we could have gone better. I particularly emphasise a lot of discipline, things like not giving easy outs like collapsing or pushing. Maybe we didn't focus on the job in hand enough. So this week we want to make sure we cover all of those things and get those things right because otherwise we'll get stung again against Georgia. "

Caught out

Feek admitted that the Irish scrum was occasionally caught out by the bigger gap between the frontrows which referee Romain Poite permitted, and hence the way they were unhinged by the greater emphasis on “the hit” which the Boks scrum brought.

"Southern Hemisphere teams probably put more emphasis on the hit than we do up here, during the Six Nations and the Argentinian tour there wasn't much of a hit and we got that at the weekend and that's something we've learnt.

“It’s just something that we’re trying to get clarity on. They’ve given us certain messages around that and we’re trying to work together, and it’s something that worked well in the Six Nations and even on the Argentinian tour there wasn’t too much of a hit. But when there is it does change things a little bit. It’s not an excuse. That’s the reality. That’s how it was at the weekend but we got caught badly a couple of times and embarrassed as well, so we want to make sure that doesn’t happen again.”

Step backwards

While the day didn’t constitute a step backwards, it was merely a sideways step in Feek’s estimation: “Because it’s hard to lose all of what you’ve done in one game. That was our first game back so all we want to do now is step forward with it and use what we had last year to keep going.

All the excuses around different things – guys not there or whatever – they are excuses that we don’t use because we’ve got guys that can do the job. So this week is about moving on and fixing all those little things that make a difference.”

If there’s a prototype of the Georgian rugby player it’s assuredly their props, and hence if there’s one thing that Georgia will bring it’s a strong scrum, and Feek was also mindful, and even a little excited, about the scrum contest which Georgia are guaranteed to bring.

“It will be just as big a contest up front as it was on the weekend. Maybe they’re not as synergised as South Africa were but they still do it every week in the Top 14 so we can’t take anything lightly, it’s going to be tough. There’s never an easy day for the pack.”

Greater clarity

There was still no greater clarity on the well-being of

Jared Payne

or

Chris Henry

. “Nothing’s changed with Jared,” said Feek, pending further scans today. “The good news is that Besty (Rory Best) was running around today, that’s a positive. With a calf injury, once you get running around with it it’s a good sign, so it was good to see.”

However Feek admitted that Best was unlikely to feature against Georgia. “We’re big on making guys train during the week and so it’s unlikely that he’ll play or be available this week.”

He also conceded that they would weigh up Jack McGrath’s heavy workload over 73 minutes, and those 17 tackles, as against Mike Ross’s need for game time, suggesting a frontrow of David Kilcoyne, Richardt Strauss and Ross.