AT THE end of the Lions tour to South Africa in July, Jamie Heaslip promised the Springboks a hot welcome to Croke Park on the last Saturday of November.
And as Ireland brought his pledge to fruition, Heaslip enthusiastically celebrated the 15-10 victory over the world champions.
It was, he said, just one of three in the autumn programme Ireland wanted to win; but ‘a special victory’ all the same. He said: "while it probably meant a lot personally to those of us who toured South Africa with the Lions, it was also a triumph for others. It highlighted the ability of the players and the squad we have in Ireland, it showed we have generated the right mentality and, really, I’m happy with that performance for the guys from one to 22 and for the guys who were not out there, the guys who have been training with us over the last number of weeks."
If there was one regret from the autumn series, Heaslip is annoyed Ireland didn’t win all three games! "Australia, to be fair, they stuck it to us, took their chances, but I thought we were maybe unlucky not to win it rather than draw," he said.
At half time on Saturday Irish supporters feared the worst. Adrift by four points and struggling to hold a dominant South African scrum, the omens were not good. But Heaslip said the fans need not have worried.
"I thought we were in a pretty good place to be honest. If you look at the Six Nations, I think we were pretty much behind in most of the games at the break but we were very confident and sure of ourselves. They took their try well but I think it was a little bit against the run of the game, we just had to be disciplined and control what we could control.
"We did that very well in the second half and created a lot of ball for the backs to play with and got position. I thought we played some very smart rugby and put them under a lot of pressure; we were probably unlucky not to get a try for ourselves, maybe even two," he said.
Heaslip was also delighted the Irish players stood up to the physicality of the Springboks: "They’re not exactly ladyboys; they’re big hard men and they get around the field. In the end it boiled down to our ability to meet them at the collision zones and it was imperative for us to be able to win those battles.
"Our aim was to get impact tackles in and slow down their ball and I think we did that very successfully and they were unable to slow down as much of our ball as they wanted to. We were very confrontational, and went after their line out and did pretty well; that didn’t surprise me because we have a pretty good line out both in attack and defence. Paul (O’Connell) did a lot of homework on them," he said.
I Heaslip went on: "For the whole game we decided to get at them, to hit them, hit them and hit them again and put them under pressure to see if they could stay with us; the penalties came in the crucial last 30 minutes when we had put them under that pressure and forced them to make mistakes."
The Springboks made unforced crucial errors, too, claimed substitute Gordon D’Arcy, who was amazed the Boks persisted with the high ball tactic against full-back Rob Kearney.
"A huge bonus for us was Kearns taking those balls out of the air, catching them almost on the run and carrying it straight back at them. You know that was a huge thing for our pack to be able to look at a full-back carrying it right back at them. You would have to question why a team would take the risk kicking balls to Kearney time after time when it clearly wasn’t working; you just have to question that game plan," he said.
Even though D’Arcy has played alongside Brian O’Driscoll on well over 100 occasions, nothing the skipper does surprises him any more. Commenting on O’Driscoll’s huge hit on South African full-back Zane Kirchner in the last seconds, D’Arcy remarked: "I have no doubt he knew exactly what he was going to do. Brian knew the guy was good enough to release the ball out the backs if he didn’t take him; he wouldn’t have made that hit without thinking about it and of the consequences."
The tackle was just one example of how Ireland coped with the physicality of the Boks, with D’Arcy declaring: "The Springboks played as they do, they tried to bully us off the field but there was no way that was going to happen; it was especially pleasing to come out well of physical stakes, we’re now a team to be reckoned with."
a d v e r t i s e m e n t
This appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Monday, November 30, 2009
