No quick-fire solutions for Sexton in the school of hard knocks

Felipe Contepomi knows how it feels; the man in the No. 10 shirt, the main man in a big team — just waiting to be smashed.

Take him out, and you remove one of the most dangerous weapons in an opposition’s armoury.

But when is enough, enough? When do you stop side-stepping the flying No. 7?

When do you speak up and hit back?

Johnny Sexton is asking those questions once again after another week where he’s in the cross-hairs of a hungry opponent.

Asking questions and struggling for answers.

Felipe Contepomi

Can Contepomi, his Leinster coach and former competition, offer any advice?

“I’d say do what I say, not what I did,” the Argentine replied, with a laugh.

“I was a very fiery guy as well, sometimes I reacted not in the best way, maybe even fighting, and that takes you out of the game, so that’s not the right decision.

“I understand his decision, you can see him not reacting, talking to the ref, staying down — and then people ask why is he staying down?

If he stands up and goes, it’s ‘he should have stayed down, it makes it look worse...’”

Over the weekend, Sexton spoke of being unable to find the right response to being singled out.

Whatever way he’s reacted, it’s been of little assistance.

Contepomi spotted a couple of hits in Rome that were ‘definitely late’, but such is the lot of a player willing to risk himself by playing so close to the line.

The player looked more than a little ticked off when he was replaced by Jack Carty with minutes to go — surely a general frustration with the team’s performance, but also, as Joe Schmidt claimed, a reaction to the late hits.

“Definitely for a No 10, and a playmaker, to receive cheap shots will always get you out of the game, or you’ll get frustrated, but now with the TMO, high tackles and so on, we can protect the players,” Contepomi said.

“If the TMO can see, if there are cheap shots and late tackles, it should be dealt with by the refs, they have a very good system of analysing what was good or bad at the weekend, and if they see that they haven’t dealt (with an incident) properly, they will next game.

“He just needs to focus on keeping playing, I’m sure he’ll do that, he’s a competitor, he wants to get better, and as far as... I’m sure nobody is very happy with the [Ireland] performance, but they got what they wanted and that was the bonus point, so they’re still on track.”

Ireland achieved that in spite of the general display, with Sexton and Conor Murray struggling to get the team motoring like they can.

Contepomi knows that being the main men comes with a weight of expectation that can feel unfair at times.

“No. 9 and No. 10 are the conductors in every team, but it’s not about them alone, everyone has to play their own part,” Contepomi said.

“When you make the calls it’s like the quarterback in the NFL — when things go right and the team plays beautifully, they give the credit to him, when the team doesn’t play well, they get on their back.

Everyone has to play their part, everyone’s in the same boat. I understand people will ask about No. 9 and No. 10, but you have one of the best 9s and best 10s in the game, so that’s maybe why you demand a bit more.

There is more expected of every player in green, especially when this year’s performances are contrasted with those of 2018.

But is it a blip — or a trend? Was Ireland’s World Cup optimism misplaced?

“I still believe they’re in a good spot, three months ago they beat the All Blacks, they may not be happy, but it’s part of their learning and getting better, it’s what they have to go through to get better,” Contepomi said.

“The crucial moments will be those two to three months before the World Cup when they get together, when they have time to work on combinations.

“At the moment, you have a lot of players coming from good teams like Leinster, Munster, Ulster, Connacht. They are all doing reasonably well and maybe they come with another chip and to switch on a chip for one week, try to be at their best, you can’t work those combinations.

“Once they go into those two-and-a-half months before a World Cup, they switch mode to Ireland and the World Cup, I’d say they’ll be okay.”