We need to progress a step further, insists Eddie

EDDIE O’SULLIVAN has set tough goals for Ireland as they prepare to embark on the tour of New Zealand and Australia this week — at least one victory over the All Blacks and another against Australia.

O’Sullivan is intent on Ireland maintaining a 75% success rate in international rugby since he took over.

Ireland play the world No 1’s twice, in Hamilton on June 10 and Auckland a week later. The game against Australia is in Perth on June 24.

History shows these games will be almost impossible tasks for Ireland. Yet O’Sullivan can look back to previous tours, in 1992 and 2002, when Ireland came close to winning the first of two Tests in Dunedin’s Carisbrook, a ‘House of Pain’ for many a visiting team.

Ireland lost 21-24 in the first of those tours and they lost 6-15 four years ago — both opening Tests. Trouble is, you really only get one crack at the All Blacks. In the second Test, 14 years ago, New Zealand won 59-6 and they took the second in 2002 40-8.

As Ireland get together in Limerick this week, O’Sullivan admits he is well aware Ireland must hit the ground running.

“We haven’t won big matches on tour for a long time. We need to prove that we can do that to take our progress a step further.”

But if O’Sullivan has had to carefully balance his squad — he’s also obliged to send a strong unit to the Churchill Cup in the USA — he is enthusiastic.

The Irish boss is aware of the positive attitude of players involved in trophy winning seasons with their provinces: “Yes, I can judge it when guys come into the Six Nations squads and they’re on a high; it’s a great boost. In turn, we had a very good Six Nations, and they go back to their provinces on a high. It’s a question of the provinces feeding the national side and vice versa.”

Four years ago, Ireland had New Zealand on the rack for much of the opening Test. This time, if they can play as well again, O’Sullivan believes they have the ability to win.

“There is a lot more experience in the side now. They’re coming off a long season, we have to be aware of that, but for most of the players it has been a very successful season,” he said.

He also acknowledges New Zealand are now the best side in the world, despite what notions England, as reigning world champions, might have.

“We all saw what they did to the Lions last year; we know what they did to us in Dublin in the autumn,” he said, though he noted Ireland were without Paul O’Connell and Brian O’Driscoll.

“It was early in the season for us, we were going through somewhat of a transition and I think we’re a much better balanced side now.”

O’Sullivan would love to be in a position that the Irish teams of 1992 and 2002 found themselves in. Ireland could, and perhaps should, have won both matches. Still, he’s well aware of the challenge.

“New Zealand could be a bit rusty because it’s their first game of the season. But we have to look to ourselves, put in the performance and give ourselves a chance of winning. New Zealand, no matter what names they have in the side, are bloody good. They have got themselves into a fantastic situation by bringing several players through, giving them the experience, and it’s all a build up to the World Cup from their point of view.”

He has put all thoughts of the journey home via Perth, and the match against Australia, on hold. “It’s a short tour, but tough. We can only focus on New Zealand for starters. It’s a match by match situation,” he said.

But, like All Blacks coach Graham Henry, O’Sullivan is also looking at development patterns. He doesn’t have quite the same quantity or quality, but he awaits news of progress from the US as well this summer.

Michael Bradley will coach the Churchill Cup team, and he is sure to have his hands full. “Because we need the players in New Zealand and Australia, I suppose it’s fair to say that the squad going to America is not quite second string; it’s a bit below that. But it should be very good for the players.

“Maybe, if the Churchill Cup wasn’t on I would have brought a few of the younger players. But they’ll get opportunities to play in America. It will be a measure of how good they are, because they play a full USA side and a New Zealand Maori team. These two games will be very difficult,” he said.