Coming out swinging

After getting their early season back on track with the victory over Munster, new coach Joe Schmidt must quickly refocus on the small matter of the European Cup. He spoke yesterday to Alan Good.

WHEN Joe Schmidt pitched up in Dublin to begin his stint as Leinster’s new coach this summer, a myriad of new challenges awaited.

Satisfying the demand for success after Magners League and Heineken Cup wins? He anticipated that. Same goes for having to stamp his more subtle methods on a side accustomed to the abrasiveness of Michael Cheika.

What the 44-year-old New Zealander hadn’t expected though, was to find himself having to second guess himself by translating training ground instructions back into his native language – a leftover trait from his three-year stint in France as backs coach with Clermont Auvergne.

“Coaching in English again is a luxury for me!” he smiles. “After three years of coaching in French, I’ll be about to say something to the boys, and it’s about to come out in French; I’ve got to think of the translation, which is bizarre.

“But apart from that, I’ve enjoyed it so far. The best thing is my kids are happy in school and my wife’s happy, so that makes my settling a lot easier, and I’ve found that the players are a really good bunch, really professional, and that makes it easier as well.”

Leinster fans may have been forgiven for thinking that the new man’s communiques were indeed getting lost in translation. One win from their first four Magners League encounters, including a humbling 29-13 defeat at Benetton Treviso, was far below the standards they had come to expect.

Sacking the coach at the first sign of trouble, Premier League-style, is not commonplace in rugby. But just a couple of games into his tenure, Schmidt was already facing questions about his future. The questioning wasn’t confined to the new man; following a wretched defeat in Edinburgh, Brian O’Driscoll was asked if the Leinster players seemed disinterested.

Schmidt comes across as an affable chap, but there is little mistaking the underlying irritation he feels about having his talisman’s commitment called into question.

“I think (Brian) was disappointed with that question, after the service he’s given Ireland and Leinster,” he offers. “Sometimes people have some pretty short memories, because I don’t think too many would question Brian O’Driscoll’s commitment, and I think he answered it in the very best way against Munster.

“He put in some smashing tackles, he finished a try, almost created another – I thought it was the ideal performance.”

Many had predicted the arrival of the old enemy at the gleaming new Aviva Stadium last weekend came at exactly the wrong time for Leinster. A Munster victory would have represented the blues’ worst start to the season in some time.

But the very thought of the southerners taking the spoils seemed to ignited the necessary fire, and something resembling the real Leinster emerged – brutal and unrelenting in defence, and able to pick the lock when it mattered in attack, to win out 13-9.

Schmidt was undoubtedly a relieved man afterwards, but resisted the temptation to make a point to his critics, and deflected all the praise towards his players. Quietly though, he must be hopeful that an early-season watershed has been reached, admitting he has struggled to adapt to the demands of the IRFU Player Welfare Programme.

“There have been some testing periods,” he says with a pause. “Having to rotate players and work with players on different training programmes was something new and different, and I’m not sure I got it right. But it’s something I hope I’ve learned from.”

Now his attention turns to the Heineken Cup, where Leinster have been lumped into one of the toughest pools in tournament history, alongside Schmidt’s former employers Clermont Auvergne, Saracens and dark horses Racing Metro.

Clermont’s Aurelien Rougerie says his side are now gunning for Europe, having finally ended a century-long wait to lift the Bouclier de Brennus by winning the French Top 14 last term.

Schmidt was central to that success, and is uniquely positioned to offer an educated take on the psyche of a side for whom the Heineken Cup has not always been top priority. He thinks Rougerie’s assertion should be taken at face value.

“After 99 years of trying, in their 11th final, the Championnat was the thing that they needed to have,” says Schmidt. “The monkey (on their backs) became a gorilla. With that off their back, they are going to have a spring in their step.”

First up though, Leinster must welcome Top 14 leaders Racing Metro – with Lionel Nallet, Juan Martin Hernandez and Francois Steyn in tow – to the RDS tomorrow.

That mouthwatering clash comes amid murmurs that the Magners League sides will struggle to keep pace with the moneyed French outfits, but Schmidt signs off on the matter with forceful optimism.

“Winning is non-negotiable for us. We don’t have Scarlets or Brive to go away and win at, or try to get a bonus point,” he says. “Unfortunately, against opposition like Racing, we can’t say ‘This is a game we will win’, because they have the means to make it very difficult for us. On the other hand, we’ll be throwing everything we can into it to try and make that result a positive one.

“A number of people have said to me that Racing haven’t played Heineken Cup rugby. But a lot of their players have played a lot of Heineken Cup games, and won’t be under any illusions about what it takes to be competitive.

“I think the French clubs are very strong. I don’t want to say there has been a swing (towards them) because if there is a swing, it’s not good for us. So we’ll hold onto our bat and try to swing it as best we can.”