Sexton: I’ve had to pinch myself over dream year

Johnny Sexton reflected on a landmark year for Ireland as he accepted the Guinness Rugby Writers Ireland Player of the Year award and did not waste too long stressing the importance of staying at the peak of the world game.

Last season was a remarkable body of work for the fly-half, who won not just a Six Nations Grand Slam and a series in Australia but also an historic Champions Cup and Guinness PRO14 double.

And it has continued in some style as Ireland made the rugby world sit up and take notice with a victory over the All Blacks last Saturday.

As Sexton, 33, spoke this week to discuss his personal award, voted for by members of the Irish rugby media, the scale of Ireland’s achievements in beating New Zealand for the first time on home soil and keeping them tryless and in single figures in the process, was still sinking in.

But throughout the conversation the drive to improve and maintain his team’s status was never far from the surface.

Beating the All Blacks in Dublin had long been the target for Sexton and the rest of Joe Schmidt’s team, he revealed.

It was a game that had obviously been on our radar, probably on our horizon since winning the Grand Slam. Going to Australia was obviously a huge thing to do because we hadn’t won a Test series there in ages and that was very important for us but all the time, this was the fixture that you’re thinking about.

“Especially over the summer when Australia was finished, you’re thinking, ‘right’. You’re looking at the season’s fixtures and thinking, ‘okay, Six Nations, European Cup, all those big games but the one that sticks out is that All Blacks game, a shot at the best. And they are the best.

"They’re clearly the best team in the world and we matched them on one day and now we’ve got to keep going and keep ourselves up near the top for a while.

“It was a great effort from everyone really. We had a good plan and we executed the plan pretty well. It shows us what we can do and we’ve just got to stay on top of it now. It’s important we back it up this week as well.”

The reaction outside the Irish camp to the 16-9 victory has been as white-hot and ecstatic as the atmosphere was inside Aviva Stadium on Saturday night, as supporters cast their minds towards the World Cup in Japan starting next September and the potential for Joe Schmidt’s team, currently ranked second in the world.

Yet Sexton has more immediate goals and warned against thinking too far ahead.

“The Six Nations is always big. I know people are almost kind of bypassing it but we’re certainly not as players. We’re defending champions and we want to do that again. That’s the next big thing for us with Ireland.

"Obviously, we’ll be going back to our clubs in between and we’ll be concentrating on that but from an Irish point of view, the next big thing for us is the Six Nations.

“We’re not thinking about the World Cup. A lot of people in the public want to drag us there straight away and start talking about it but it’s Six Nations for us now and backing things up a bit and trying to go and achieve something there.”

Sexton endorsed head coach Schmidt’s view last Saturday that Ireland are going to have to get better again if they are to sustain their momentum through 2019.

New Zealand will say they weren’t at their best and we’ll feel we put a lot of pressure on them to make the game like that. 

"But they’ll learn a lot from that game and they’ll get better, if they have room for that after the season they’ve had, demolishing everyone in the Rugby Championship bar one game.

“So they’ll look back on that one game and even the England game (the previous week, which they won 16-15) and learn some good lessons and they’ll get better.

“I think now in the Six Nations, because we won the championship last year and we’ve beaten New Zealand, we’re going to have a target on our head and teams are going to play us as the underdog so we’re going to have to come up with a way to deal with that and that’s the challenge for us now.

"We’re going to have to get better because other teams are definitely going to do that around us.” For all the forward-facing focus, Sexton did allow himself to reflect on last season’s unprecedented success.

“Yeah, it’s been a pretty special year when you consider everything that’s happened with the Grand Slam. If you got offered a Grand Slam at the start of the year and nothing else you’d have snapped someone’s hand off for it, it’s such a big thing and it’s been in Ireland so few times.

“But then when that happens, you reset your goals back in Leinster and you want to go back and achieve there and that rolled into the double. And then going to Australia and doing the job.

“It’s been incredible, I’ve had to pinch myself a little bit. But at the same time, there’s been a hell of a lot of hard work that goes into it, so it doesn’t happen by accident, from a collective point of view and it’s been a brilliant year, so far.

“Now winning two games in November, and there’s a little bit left.”

Beating New Zealand at home was particularly satisfying, Sexton said.

“Yeah, that’s history. That’s the first time. It’s always special to win the first time, do something for the first time, so to beat them in Ireland for the first time is very very special as well.

"Grand Slams had been done before so you could argue that that’s probably the highlight.

"It’s very hard but look, when you consider the whole year… if someone had told we’d win all this at the start of the year I would have laughed at them.

“At the same time, even though I would have laughed at them, it’s what you dream of as well. You always have to think big and we’re certainly doing that but it’s the work that goes on behind the scenes that people don’t see.

"They just see the end product and you can often work as hard as that in all the previous years and get nothing out of it.

"Then one year it all falls into place, so it’s funny how things work out.”