Andy Farrell and Johnny Sexton have a clear vision for this Ireland team, and what they can achieve in the coming years.
The Covid-19 pandemic meant Farrell only had three games as head coach, and five weeks with the squad together, before northern hemisphere rugby was shut down for six months. 2020/21 was severely disrupted by that pandemic, but we started to see what Farrell and Sexton had in mind at the tail-end of this year's Six Nations.
Ireland got over a tough start to the campaign and finished with wins over Italy, Scotland and England. They followed that up with summer romps over Japan and the USA. Last Saturday, they shredded Japan 60-5 with the same relentless, hard-running play that comprehensively did for England.
On the latest House of Rugby URC episode [LISTEN from 32:00 below] we heard from Sexton as he pondered the toughest question of his captaincy, so far - can Ireland replicate that Japan performance and beat New Zealand with an expansive, bold game-plan?
[caption id="attachment_240354" align="aligncenter" width="640"]Ireland captain Johnny Sexton, left, lines up alongside his team before the Autumn Nations Series match against Japan at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. (Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile)[/caption]
Johnny Sexton on Ireland's evolving playing style
Looking back at that Six Nations campaign, earlier this year, the red card to Peter O'Mahony scuppered Ireland's chances against Wales, but the biggest disappointment for Andy Farrell came in a limp home loss to France.
Sexton missed that game after getting concussed in the narrow loss to Wales, but Ireland began to really click when he returned for those final three games of the campaign.
Against Japan, last weekend, Ireland went light on box-kicks and heavy on offloads, and players running onto the ball from all angles. There was a desire to play the ball in contact and out-gas the opposition. Asked if Ireland could replicate that against New Zealand, Sexton responded:
"That’s how we have been trying to play for the last year but we have had some lessons along the way and we have had to do something a bit different. It does take time to bed in.
"With international rugby you never get a long period to work on it. With Leinster you’ve got a full year together, with Ireland you might have four sessions and you can’t training every day obviously.
"If you had seen us last Thursday, we were… not a mess but we were back together for the first time and it is testament to the coaching staff that they hit us with the right amount of information each day to make sure that come this week we were ready to go."
[caption id="attachment_207055" align="aligncenter" width="640"]Johnny Sexton of Ireland celebrates late in the 2018 match against New Zealand at the Aviva Stadium. (Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile)[/caption]
Johnny Sexton looking for fourth win over the All Blacks
The Ireland captain has beaten New Zealand on three occasions in his career, to date. Twice with Ireland [2016 and 2018] and once with the British & Irish Lions.
With several Irish players in good form, and off the back of a big win, Sexton was asked if he was confident heading into this Saturday's date with the All Blacks. He replied:
"I don’t think you would ever say you are really confident about beating the All Blacks because you need to get away from thinking about the result. You need to go and look after the process and bring out your very best performance and that will give you a chance. If you don’t do that you have no chance so will do our analysis on them.
"They have some really dangerous players and a very good coaching team. They have had some great results of late and we will give them all the attention they deserve but we have to focus on making sure we give our best version of ourselves next Saturday."
Saturday will be a perfect test for whether Ireland are on the right path under the leadership of Farrell and Sexton. They will be hoping to make the rugby world once again sit forward and take notice.
WATCH THE LATEST HOUSE OF RUGBY HERE:
Ireland captain Johnny Sexton, left, lines up alongside his team before the Autumn Nations Series match against Japan at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. (Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile)[/caption]
Johnny Sexton of Ireland celebrates late in the 2018 match against New Zealand at the Aviva Stadium. (Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile)[/caption]
