Sexton: Blame the players, not the Schmidt blueprint

In Joe we trust.

It’s been the most consistent mantra in Irish rugby this past decade, and yet the Rugby World Cup is doing some job in tarnishing the otherwise exemplary body of work which Ireland’s head coach has put together in almost 10 years in charge of Leinster and then the national team.

Floored by Argentina in Cardiff four years ago, Ireland now find themselves on the ropes in Pool A after the beating they suffered at the hands of Japan in Shizuoka on Saturday. Questions are being asked of everybody, including the man who for so long had the Midas touch.

Joe Schmidt had his critics, even when Ireland were winning game after game. ‘Too robotic’ was the main crib, particularly when it came to an attacking game that leaned heavily on an attritional style up front. Now everything to do with this team is open for deliberation.

Jonathan Sexton isn’t buying it.

The Ireland out-half has been playing under Schmidt’s watch every since the latter arrived from Clermont Auvergne in France and, whatever it is that has ailed Ireland through a stuttering 2019, the veteran 10 believes its roots are not in the brains trust, but with those on the pitch.

“Joe is an excellent coach and we have full belief in him. His record is the best of an Ireland coach by a country mile, and what he has done for us as a team over the last six or seven years — and for me, 10 years — I don’t have to go and keep talking about it. That’s there. And sometimes people want to maybe turn it whatever way they want.

“He’ll do what he always does, he’ll have a plan for this week and, ultimately, he had a great plan for the Japan game and we just didn’t execute it well enough. That’s the bottom line — players will always take responsibility because the times that we’ve done the gameplan to the best of our ability, we’ve won, I think, every time. We’ve often said we go out with the gameplan and it’s how well we can execute it that will decide the result.”

Sexton didn’t feature against Japan and the reasons why were still subject to some conjecture until he fronted up at the team’s latest HQ, in Kobe, yesterday. What we know is that he didn’t train last Monday or Tuesday and that the staff made the decision not to go with him.

What Sexton didn’t say is whether he was 100% fit by game day, but he did confirm that he is on track to kick from the tee against Russia on Thursday having handed over the duties to Conor Murray for most of the Scotland game after picking up a quad injury.

He kicked in training yesterday morning and is due to train again tomorrow. All going well, he will be starting against the Russians here in Kobe, and he accepted the suggestion that it is up to those who are fresh and stepping in to change the mood music.

“Yeah of course. When you’re a senior player in the group, that’s your job all the time. Even more so when you’ve come off the back of a very disappointing defeat. The team will be very different this week but, ultimately, you’ve got to pick 23 from 31 so there are going to be guys who are backing up three games. That’s the nature of a World Cup.

“We’ve had it on the Lions tours where you’ve had to play three games in a week. So it can sometimes be tough. But at other times you can get into a bit of a rhythm and a routine and the games can work out in your favour. Hopefully I’ll get to go out this Thursday with the boys and we can put in a performance we can be proud of and, more importantly, put us in a good position to get into the quarter-final.”

No better man to rally the troops, or to address the world, after a shock like this.

There was even a suggestion from him that this may even be a “blessing in disguise”, given he was part of two World Cups where Ireland negotiated the pools unbeaten and then lost in the last eight. Tough sell, that one, but he made the point that Ireland have rebounded from defeats already this year.

Sexton painted the picture of an Ireland side enthused by a five-day turnaround, ready to tear into Russia as it attempts to regain lost ground, even if the question remains as to why they keep finding themselves in scramble mode in the first place.

There is something missing from this Ireland team right now and maybe the worrying thing is that the symptoms aren’t always consistent. Against Japan, it was ill- discipline, a failure to turn the screw when they had their opponents under pressure, and some poor exits from their own red zone.

Add all of these disjointed efforts up, and Ireland have it all to do to right their course as they travel further down the length of Japan’s Honshu Island this week with the doubts and concerns of their supporters following in their wake.

“The guys gave it everything yesterday. No-one can deny that, and no-one can point the finger and say there wasn’t a lack of effort. It was wholehearted and if we flip those margins and those small errors and mistakes that we spoke about (in the team meeting) this morning, then the game can be very different.

“Even at the end, you know, we were one metre out from their line and we scored against Scotland in those situations maybe two or three times in the first half… three times out of three probably when we didn’t take the one against Japan. So it’s small things,” he assured, “and we’ll fix them up.”