Patience will prove key for Kidney

TO succeed in international competition requires a range of specific characteristics but for Declan Kidney’s men, deep in preparation for the greatest rugby show on earth — the World Cup — patience is probably the most important ingredient his players need to discover at this stage.

So much effort has gone into their pre-season that all the players are now desperate for game time. It is also inevitable, as we witnessed both in Murrayfield and Twickenham on Saturday, that a period of adjustment is required to transfer what has been achieved on the training paddock to the heart of international competition.

Sharpness and accuracy can only be achieved by repetition under pressure and unfortunately training is no substitute for the real thing. That can lead to frustrations and tensions as set piece routines and structured plays break down in the heat of battle.

Hence the necessity for patience.

All of the northern hemisphere sides are experiencing that at present and hopefully our French counterparts will endure the same lesson when they meet what is certain to be a different Irish side in Bordeaux on Saturday evening to the one that featured in Edinburgh.

All one can do is work your way through this difficult period and hope that things click into place before the real key clashes begin, in Ireland’s case that crucial encounter with Australia in Auckland on September 17.

The Irish management would have scrutinised and analysed Australia’s defeat to New Zealand on Saturday and while that game, not surprisingly, was played at an entirely different level of intensity and physicality, there was sufficient evidence to suggest that this Wallaby side still have a number of chinks that Ireland can capitalise on.

That is for another day, however, as the Irish management is focused on getting the balance of their potential World Cup squad up to speed so where better to start than against France? The next two games take the feel of a mini test series with the French returning to Dublin on Saturday week. At this stage I would settle for an aggregate win over the series as these two games, with the clash against Connacht squeezed in between, will provide the final pieces of information for Declan Kidney to complete his squad.

Given that this World Cup is taking place in New Zealand, over 30 hours flying time away, if is vital that Kidney gets every selection right. Every one of that 30-man squad must be fit and prepared for battle as the challenge of flying in fresh replacements, ready to perform the minute they get off the plane, is a key logistical issue.

Is it any wonder that some teams are considering the option of placing some players on standby in Australia? The structure of that would be quite difficult as those players would be forced to train in isolation without any game time for up to four weeks. The hosts, of course, will have no such difficulties, not as if they need any other advantage.

New Zealand were very impressive in Saturday’s contest with all their key players performing magnificently. Dan Carter made a mockery of those who rate Australia’s Quade Cooper ahead of him as the world’s leading practitioner at out half with a complete performance both in attack and defence.

Cooper, a key player for the Wallabies, showed once again that while he is a prodigious talent if afforded the space to play — and therein is the key — he can be closed down and forced into errors.

The other key match up was between the game’s two best foragers in Richie McCaw and David Pocock. Once again the man in black came out on top. McCaw had the advantage of performing in the more effective back row unit as Jerome Kaino and Kieran Reid were magnificent.

Rocky Elsom, who missed practically the entire Super rugby season, is still struggling for match fitness while No 8 Ben McCalman is unproven at this level. On that showing I’d fancy an Irish back row of Sean O’Brien, David Wallace and Jamie Heaslip, with some serious impact off the bench from a fit Stephen Ferris, shading that crucial battle.

The biggest worry with all these warm ups is the inevitability that some poor soul is going to lose out on rugby’s biggest prize by picking up an injury. Already Scarlets winger Morgan Stoddart saw his dreams evaporate with a broken ankle in Twickenham while England captain Lewis Moody suffered a mild strain of the medial ligament in his right knee.

If Saturday’s game in Edinburgh showed anything it is that there is still a gulf between some of our front liners and their back up charges. At this stage Mike Ross is key to Ireland’s scrummaging efforts and England showed once again in that clash against Wales just how pivotal a role a dominant scrum will play in New Zealand.

At present, Ireland are operating with three separate front row units, Cian Healy, Rory Best and Ross who are likely to start against France, last Saturday’s combination of Tom Court, Sean Cronin and Tony Buckley who encountered some problems in Murrayfield and Marcus Horan, Jerry Flannery and John Hayes who finished out that contest impressively.

At this stage the challenge for all the management teams is getting their various combinations right. Already England’s new midfield duo of Manu Tuilagi and Riki Flutey looks infinitely more potent than the more powerful but pedantic pairing of Shontayne Hape and Mike Tindall which manned the midfield in their championship winning Six Nations side of last season. That is what these games are all about.

With reports that the French players have been locked away in various camps for the last two months it will be interesting to see what combinations Marc Lièvremont throws at Ireland on this occasion. Already he has dispensed of the survives of Clément Poitrenaud and Yannick Jauzion for the World Cup, despite the fact that they finished the season so well for Toulouse, and much faith has been placed on the return to fitness in midfield of Perpignan’s Maxime Mermoz.

Saturday also presents another opportunity to run the rule over Australia when they meet the real South Africa for the first time in this Tri-Nations series in Durban. That will add further to the jigsaw that Kidney will hope to complete before that date with destiny in Auckland next month.