Italy, and Schmidt, still trying to pin down Larmour

When you play as well as Jordan Larmour did in his first start for Ireland on Saturday night, it is difficult not to reach for the sky.

A stunning second-half hat-trick for the 21-year-old may have come against a weak Italian team but the skillset displayed by Larmour, first at full-back, then on the wing, was such that superlatives are the only option.

The potential has been apparent for some time as Larmour cut a swathe through the schoolboy and then age-grade ranks, always a step or three in front of his contemporaries. That culminated in a debut senior campaign last season which began with a Leinster debut and finished with a Six Nations winner’s medal, a Grand Slam and a series win in Australia. The dream start to his professional career saw him last week earn a nomination for World Rugby’s Breakthrough Player of the Year thanks to those six appearances off the Irish bench and Larmour reminded the jury of his credentials as he made every minute of his first Test start count.

He was justifiably pumped following his show-stealing performance as he lit up a dreary Chicago afternoon with his speed, footwork and an eye for the gap. It helped a young Ireland side to a 54-7 victory to give the wider squad a perfect springboard into tougher assignments as Argentina and the All Blacks provide Guinness Series opposition on home soil in the coming fortnight and gave encouragement to the view that Ireland now have the strength in depth to mount a serious challenge at next year’s World Cup.

Larmour certainly shared that opinion in replying to a question wondering how far can this Ireland team go. His answer was plausible. Confident not hyperbolic, just a recognition of where Joe Schmidt’s side are in the rugby firmament right now as Grand Slam winners and second in the world rankings.

“Long term, we want to be World Cup champions,” Larmour said. “But there is a good bit of rugby to be played. There are three more huge games coming up this month. Then the Six Nations, so we just want to keep building on performance. We will look at this game, review it, and try to keep building and keep the momentum up. We want to keep getting better. But the sky is the limit for this team.”

Nor was his assertion that Irish teams no longer feared the top-ranked All Blacks, who visit Dublin on November 17, anything other than a simple statement of determined confidence.

Has that fear completely gone, he was asked in regard to the back-to-back world champions.

“I think so. Everyone is up for the challenge but we are up for Argentina next week. Looking to the All Blacks, no one is scared of them, no one is afraid of them. They are a quality team. So are we. We just need to turn up on the day and we can turn them over.” Steve Hanson and the New Zealand management will not lose sleep over that one as they head to Europe for their end of season tour but they will do well to do their homework on the threat Larmour may pose them if he is unleashed in 12 days.

The Italian defence may have been distinctly second division but Larmour’s talent was not in doubt as he streaked down the left wing for his third try dancing past five defenders to round off an eight-try rout.

Yet while even Joe Schmidt is not sure where Larmour’s best position is, the Ireland head coach knows with certainty that whether it is full-back or wing, he can deliver the goods either way.

The statistics form only part of the picture as Larmour, starting at full-back and finishing the game on the left wing, sped through 245 metres from 12 carries and beat 12 hapless defenders from six clean breaks. That served to provide scrum-half Luke McGrath with a first-half try and Larmour himself with three tries of his own that were each straight out of the top drawer.

If first-choice full-back Rob Kearney is a doubt for this Saturday’s Guinness Series opener against a fully-loaded Argentina, then Larmour’s performance in Chicago will have made even sweeter viewing for the Ireland head coach.

“Jordan knew that there was a window of opportunity so he wanted to open it reasonably wide and then crawl through it for three tries,” Schmidt said. “So he did that pretty well.

“He just has a contagious enthusiasm on the pitch, which is great. And in behind what you see on the pitch he works really hard, which is really positive as well. Some of the bits of the game that aren’t quite as visible he does a really good job of.”

As to Larmour’s best position, Schmidt added: “That’s a really good question because we’re still trying to work it out. I’m not sure.

“I think the freedom he gets at full-back is quite neat because he can play either side of the pitch. But you saw him on the wing at the end and if we can create a bit of space for him he’s incredibly dangerous.

“In the first half when he opened them up and sort of handed that ball off to Luke McGrath for the try he demonstrated he does both really well. So that’s one of the conundrums for us.” Italy boss Conor O’Shea on Saturday likened Larmour to a young Christian Cullen, but Schmidt will not tempt fate with comparisons to All Blacks legends and he urged caution when asked how high he thought his young star’s ceiling is.

“It’s hard to tell in a game like that. You know, they (Italy) slipped off a fair few tackles at the end and I wouldn’t envisage the Argentinians slipping off some of those tackles, they defend really well. They chase the chance really well, particularly the guys coming out of the midfield.

“So, it’s something that you don’t really talk about ceilings. You talk about incrementally growing and so far he’s incrementally taken a step each time that we’ve asked him to really.”