Reasons for Ireland to be fearful in rugby World Cup

With that tantalising World Cup clash between Ireland and France cemented in the back of my mind, I couldn’t help but watch the respective performances of Clermont Auvergne and Leinster over the weekend in the context of that crucial Pool D encounter.

Ireland’s prospects of making a first World Cup semi-final will be dictated by the outcome of that game against the French. Win and a quarter-final against Argentina beckons.

That’s manageable if not straightforward against a side that is showing continual improvement as a result of their annual involvement in the Rugby Championship. Lose and New Zealand awaits. At this point in time let’s just say — less manageable.

The problem with that is everyone seems to discount the fact that the French, despite their woeful international form of late, are certain to be thinking along the exact same lines.

Would they be confident of beating this Irish side on neutral territory in Cardiff? You better believe it.

It is in that context that I watched 14 of Ireland’s Six Nations championship winning side struggle to put away a decent but flawed Bath team on Saturday. Likewise, when you watched in awe at the ease with which Clermont crushed the Aviva Premiership’s leading side Northampton, you had to wonder why the French national side, with so many eligible Clermont players, has been so poor in recent seasons.

Twenty points to the good after 30 minutes of scintillating rugby, this quarter-final was over as a contest as a very decent Saints side faced humiliation.

Bear in mind also that this was a Clermont side minus their first choice French half backs of Morgan Parra and Camille Lopez due to injury.

As we saw against England in their last international outing on Super Saturday, France have also unearthed another cracking winger in Noa Nakaitaci who created havoc once again against the Saints.

When you consider Munster travelled to the Stade Marcel Michelin last December and emerged with a losing bonus point from a 26-19 defeat, you realise that maybe they are a bit more advanced in their development than we thought.

It is also worth noting that two of their pool opponents in Clermont and Saracens have now made the last four.

In the context of that Pool D clash, you have to flip the Clermont performance on its head and ask what did the French management team glean from Leinster’s failure to put away an inexperienced Bath outfit or even score a try.

The key difference between Leinster and Ireland however, despite the presence of all those proven Irish internationals, is the half back combinations.

The direction and authority offered by Conor Murray and Johnny Sexton on the international stage is light years ahead of that displayed by Isaac Boss and Jimmy Gopperth.

While I don’t subscribe to the regular scapegoating which Gopperth is subjected to by sections of the Leinster faithful, he is certainly not at the same level as Sexton.

Then again you could level that accusation against the vast majority of the out-halfs operating in the Champions Cup this season even if Sexton looked strangely off the pace in Racing Metro’s defeat to Saracens on Sunday.

The BT Sport commentary team offered no explanation as to why Racing’s excellent scrum-half Maxime Machenaud took over the place kicking duties from Sexton in the second half.

Sexton did take bang in the face but it has emerged that he was ill going into the game and the Racing coaching staff had to manage his game time.

At least concussion wasn’t an issue. The big worry for Ireland with the World Cup looming is that if Sexton suffered another concussion he could be ruled out for six months.

Sexton was off the field for the closing stages of the game which, in my view, cost Racing a semi-final slot as they appeared to have no conviction in their efforts to close out the tie in the closing phase.

Their forwards looked out on their feet yet tried to retain possession through a series of mini rucks 40 metres from their own posts.

You could see the penalty coming and when it did Marcelo Bosch booted them out of the tournament with the last kick of the game. Had Sexton still been on the field you suspect that situation might never have arisen.

What else did we learn from last weekend? The biggest plus to emerge was that there is still a place in the game for the smaller, more skilled operator.

George Ford offers hope to those that don’t see the game on a Saturday as an inconvenient byproduct to their week spent pumping iron in the gym. He trains to play and boy can he play. Others play to train.

Apart from a crucial missed penalty and conversion, which proved the difference between victory and defeat, Ford was spectacular and offers real hope for Bath and England into the future.

Allowed to leave Leicester Tigers to join Bath, they thought that, defensively, he would be too small to operate at this level of rugby. While he will never be a crash tackling 10 in the mould of Jonny Wilkinson, Ford continues to prove the detractors wrong, especially with ball in hand. Just ask Devin Toner.

The demands placed on the modern day second row continues to grow. No longer is it sufficient to put in a massive shift when supporting your prop at scrum time, in winning primary possession out of touch and in carrying ball and cleaning out at ruck time. You also have to be an accomplished defender.

The nightmare situation is to be found loitering in midfield with a degree of separation between you and the nearest defender.

Toner found himself in exactly that position, not once but twice, last Saturday. On both occasions he was unfortunate that Ford was in possession at that moment and immediately recognised the options available to him.

It was a bit like watching the snappy terrier giving the runaround to the labrador in the local park.

At 6’11” Toner just isn’t built for situations like that yet he copped a lot of flak for missing two tackles that led to Bath’s two tries.

Credit Ford for extracting the maximum out of the situation.

Ford offers the biggest argument why England may yet become a force to be reckoned with at the World Cup and Stuart Lancaster will be praying that he remains fit despite the fact that every monstrous back row forward will be heading down his channel between now and September.

Then again Joe Schmidt must harbour the same fear every time he watches Sexton in action. Like it or not, the No 10 remains the focal point for every team. Bottom line, if you want to be successful and win silverware, you have to have a very good one.

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