Kidney faces toughest job of all to get minds right

AS if things weren’t bad enough, our key Pool C World Cup rivals Australia produced their best performance in years to capture the Tri Nations on Saturday morning.

Now that is the type of morale booster that generates serious momentum on the eve of a major tournament.

Make no mistake this was a horrible weekend for Irish rugby. With all international competition now suspended until New Zealand open the World Cup in Auckland against Tonga on Friday week, not only have Ireland been dealt a cruel blow on the injury front but now depart from Dublin tomorrow morning with a nagging uncertainty invading their thought process on that long haul flight to their training base in Queenstown.

Contrast that with our rivals in Wales, England, Scotland and France, who head down under on the back of good quality wins, three of those at our expense. This was not in the script. When Declan Kidney put together his carefully choreographed plan for August he envisaged a scenario where the opening two games against Scotland and France would offer serious game time and the opportunity to try out different combinations.

Performance rather than results would be the key indicator.

Phase two of the plan would see the majority of his strongest side come together for the home games against France and England with the emphasis weighted on producing two wins in front of a raucous home crowd. That would generate the perfect launch pad for the journey to New Zealand. Unfortunately with four defeats, a run of worrying injuries and a cloud hanging over our attacking game, things have gone horribly off course.

In addition, Ireland’s world class back row has been decimated with that knee injury to David Wallace ruling him out of the World Cup while Sean O’Brien is also nursing a knee injury and Jamie Heaslip lasting just 34 minutes on Saturday. At least Stephen Ferris, who will now become central to Kidney’s plans, lasted a full 80 minutes of rugby for the first time since January.

The loss of the outstanding Wallace, who has already been replaced in the squad by Shane Jennings, is incalculable. His pace, ball carrying and ability to generate line breaks in midfield were vital to Ireland’s overall strategy. One is now left to wonder if a debilitating knee injury of this nature is set to end a wonderful career. He deserves more.

Kidney must contemplate playing O’Brien out of position at open side to accommodate Ferris in his back row. This is not ideal but may be required in order to restore the necessary level of physicality to the forward mix. That is badly needed as for the second Saturday in a row Ireland were physically pummelled at the breakdown. That must be rectified come the World Cup and the front five must be more committed to cleaning out opposition bodies.

One only has to cast their mind back to the game against England at the Aviva in March when, with the English travelling in search of the Grand Slam, Ireland reverted to their belligerent best and smashed England in the contact area. Whether one can attribute Ireland’s passiveness on Saturday to pre-tournament reticence only time will tell.

The biggest area of concern for Kidney at this stage is Ireland’s alarming inability to create try-scoring opportunities. Of the three tries scored against France in Dublin, two were from close range, with Cian Healy and Sean O’Brien burrowing over. Ireland also had five close-in lineout drives on Saturday but on each occasion England either killed the drive at source or Ireland lost the lineout due to poor execution.

The various midfield combinations tried by Kidney have all failed to make an impact and our regular pairing of Brian O’Driscoll and Gordon D’Arcy are worryingly short of game time, as is another midfield option Tommy Bowe. In those circumstances it was strange to see Fergus McFadden introduced on the wing instead of a spell in midfield. There has been an inability to create any semblance of quick ball at the breakdown in any of the warm up games which has completely stifled the ability of a number of different half-back partnerships to stamp their mark on proceedings.

It is somewhat ironic that the one area of concern some months ago — the scrum — now looks in decent shape with Healy in particular looking razor sharp.

The fact that Ireland will leave tomorrow without him on the flight — he is remaining in Dublin for treatment to an eye socket injury — is a further cause for concern.

It will trouble Kidney, a man well known for his meticulous attention to detail, that all these problems have arisen on the eve of the game’s biggest tournament. Physically, the vast majority of this squad are in the shape of their professional lives but it is their mental wellbeing that now needs attention.

Kidney is renowned for his ability to challenge the mental side of players, always getting the best out of them when their backs are to the wall.

He now has three weeks before that key encounter with Australia to work the oracle again.