O’Sullivan quick to hand out the plaudits

IT was inevitable after running up such an impressive scoreline against Wales in Sunday’s RBS Six Nations encounter that there should be an air of quiet satisfaction in the Irish camp.

That was evident as the players celebrated a 31-5 hammering of the reigning Six Nations champions and again when the full management team of Eddie O’Sullivan, Niall O’Donovan, Graham Steadman, Brian McLaughlin and Mark Tainton faced the media for yesterday’s press conference.

O’Sullivan admitted to being tired and looking forward to a few days rest after what had been a stressful week, but he wasn’t slow to lavish praise on the team.

If he felt a certain smugness as he faced his inquisitors, then who could blame him, as he has taken a fair bit of stick over the past few weeks.

“Peter Stringer had a fine game,” said the head coach.

“He picked his moments to snipe around the sides, which I suppose caught Wales off-guard a few times, for he’s not renowned for that. It’s an aspect of his game he’s been criticised for. We all know he’s one of the best distributors in world rugby and now he’s started to break at the right time and we’ve also noticed that instead of sweeping the ball away at ruck time, he’s beginning to run across the pillar defenders.

“They’re all small adjustments but they are good for buying time for the outside backs.

“Another who I thought did very well was Geordan Murphy who was very solid. He made some good decisions and kicked the ball very well in behind the Welsh, especially into the wind in the second half. I also thought Malcolm [O’Kelly] did well, but it was a good solid performance by the entire team.”

O’Sullivan’s praise for O’Kelly suggests that he won’t be the one to make way for Paul O’Connell’s return against Scotland. If so, that will be harsh on Donncha O’Callaghan, who turned in a powerful performance, not to mention the in-form Mick O’Driscoll who made a positive contribution in his short time on the field.

No area pleased the Irish more than their defence, with Graham Steadman, the specialist coach in this area, maintaining that “we made the Welsh look very ordinary”.

Forward coach Niall O’Donovan said: “The possession from the line-out was excellent. I thought Jerry Flannery had a superb game, we lost one line-out ball in the second half but I felt that was down to good defence by Wales. Overall, the quality of the ball we got from the set piece was excellent, unlike the Italian game when we lost the first two line-outs and that put us under pressure.”

He also felt the scrum “has been reasonable this year”.

O’Sullivan pointed to the first 20 minutes on Sunday: “Wales had eight set pieces to our four and we also gave away three penalties and a free kick. In some ways, you can win or lose a psychological battle in the first 20 if you don’t have the ball by actually stopping them from playing. They might start to ask themselves questions, to begin to think: ‘We’ve had the ball for 20 minutes and gone nowhere’.”

However, he is expecting a different kind of game against the Scots, lauding coach Frank Hadden for finding a style of play that his players believe in and insisting on respect for any side that has beaten France and England.

The consensus seems to be that this is a sub-standard championship. O’Sullivan doesn’t necessarily agree, stressing that it may be more a case that the gap between the teams has narrowed and that Italy are no longer the whipping boys.

He doesn’t see end-to-end football as overly important, all the more so because he maintains defences are dominating the game. He suggests it’s a cyclical thing, but goes along with the introduction of the bonus point system that operates in virtually every other tournament.

“What that might do is precipitate more risk taking,” he agreed.

“If you could pick up an extra point by scoring a fourth try, that would change the landscape, but as it sits at the moment, the thing that has come out is the dominance of defences.

“Another area where we’re happy is the way we have adapted to what the referee wants. We conceded nine penalties on Sunday, whereas Wales had 16 against them. In fairness, to Jonathan Kaplan, he says to the captain: ‘If there’s something happening consistently that you’re not happy with, come to me at a break in the game and I’ll have a look at it’.”