Now it’s Kidney’s turn in Aviva hotseat

It’s unlikely that it crossed Declan Kidney’s mind as he announced his latest squad at the Aviva Stadium yesterday but he did so whilst sat in the very same seat from which Giovanni Trapattoni felt the wrath of the Irish media 12 days earlier.

The Italian had just presided over that disastrous 6-1 loss to Germany, which has left his stewardship on shaky soil since, and that is a landscape with which his rugby counterpart is familiar after that 60-0 humiliation in New Zealand last June.

There were no tetchy exchanges in the Aviva Stadium media auditorium this time, no back-and-forth arguments and justifications or pidgin English, but no one is under any illusions as to the stakes involved next month. For the man and his team.

That record defeat to the All Blacks has left the Irish coach with little room for error ahead of the November Tests against South Africa and Argentina when crucial world ranking points will add an extra layer of desperation to the bubbling pot.

“The 60-0 has been mentioned,” admitted assistant coach Les Kiss.

“We did a lot of work in the last couple of little camps to just address that as a group. The one thing that encourages us is that all of the players are absolutely driven to right some wrongs.

“They’re absolutely driven to make sure that the next time they have the green jersey on here at the Aviva that they do it justice and put that one to bed. To do that we’re probably up against the most physical team in the world, in terms of being direct and physical.

“It’s going to be a huge challenge but we’re up for it.”

Squad selection aside, there was positive news with the reshuffle of the management team as Munster’s Anthony Foley returned to the fold after his brief involvement earlier this year — but this time as defence coach — and Greg Feek back as scrum guru.

Both are interesting developments for differing reasons. After all, it is only three weeks since Leinster coach Joe Schmidt spoke about how his fellow Kiwi’s decision to end his involvement with Ireland would benefit the European champions.

Even more noteworthy is, only a week earlier, Kidney was quizzed about the possibility of adding to the coaching ticket after rumblings about how Kiss was being asked to do too much between defence and attack.

Kidney’s response was that he “wouldn’t envisage any changes there” which makes yesterday’s appointment of Foley a major U-turn and yet it is one to be welcomed given Brian O’Driscoll’s admittance that players had been sometimes confused over which coaches to ask about what.

Better late than never and all that.

Kidney explained the decision not to co-opt anyone onto his backroom staff for the summer tour by pointing to the lack of time and sessions available to the side before it’s departure but he expressed similar concerns about the window available in the weeks to come.

The tourists may be rusty after five weeks in abeyance but they will return to the park with the systems, calls and concerns of the Rugby Championship fresh in the memory. Ireland will be bridging a gap of five months.

By the time the sides kick-off on November 10, Ireland will have had seven full training sessions and the head coach spoke in some detail of the need to find a balance between structures and systems and giving players their head.

“As a man said to me one time, ‘the trick is knowing what you can afford to leave out’,” he explained.

Assistant coach and South African native Gert Smal added: “They’re very rigid in the way they want to play.

“The big thing is their kicking game, their territory game, and mauling and physicality. Those are the things we have to go and match.

“Like Declan says, this is why you want to be in coaching and why you want to play this game, for these kind of games, especially because it’s South Africa. I want to beat South Africa more than any Irishman wants to beat them.”

That may be debatable.