Another O’Gara pointer for Kidney

RONAN O’GARA gave Declan Kidney another strong hint he is the man to take Ireland into the World Cup quarter-finals as the starting fly-half for next Sunday’s winner takes all pool finale against Italy.

The veteran out-half made the most of his first start of the tournament by scoring 15 points with the boot from six conversions and a penalty as Ireland ran in seven tries on his watch to secure a bonus point in what would eventually become a nine-try, 62-12 victory over Russia at the Rotorua International Stadium.

O’Gara also became Ireland’s record World Cup points scorer with his sixth and final conversion of the evening, breaking his tie with David Humphreys and moving him to 72 points. Chief rival Jonny Sexton converted one of the two tries Ireland scored after he replaced O’Gara in the 67th minute.

It was the 34-year-old Munster star who collected the man of the match award in his 116th appearance for his country, his crossfield kick to Fergus McFadden in the corner having got the try fest under way in the ninth minute.

“The longer we stay in New Zealand, the ante keeps increasing and you have to have, from a backs point of view, 10 or 12 fellas looking to get into seven starting spots,” O’Gara said before explaining how felt pressure free at his third and final World Cup.

“I’m just playing rugby now with a smile on my face. I felt an awful lot of pressure for 10 years of my career but at this stage I don’t read too much into it. I get on with it and realise that there is more to life than rugby.

“This is the be all and end all, obviously, but I think when you have kids or when you have a family you appreciate that you have to find abalance. I really enjoy it. People probably felt there was pressure on me for a big performance but I didn’t think it.

“I was disappointed not to start againstAustralia but I know I have an important role to play in the squad and you soon get over that. You can have as much of an impact in 30 minutes as you can in 80 minutes. My head is in a good place and I just want this team to go as well as possible and to be a part of it.”

O’Gara’s thoughts quickly turned to nextSunday’s Pool C showdown with Italy, against whom he scored a late, game-winning drop goal in Rome earlier this year.

“There’s no point beating Australia if we don’t front up next week,” he said. “We could be going home on Monday if we don’t beat Italy. They seem to have improved and we were lucky to get out of jail in Rome this year.

“They are an emotional team, we saw the benefits of emotion when we played Australia so we have to make sure we take a day or two off, chill out and then refocus from Tuesday.”