Ciara Griffin driving from Kerry to Dublin with car windows down as Covid precaution

Ciara Griffin

If you think it’s odd playing a Six Nations game in October, just imagine driving from Kerry to Dublin with the car windows down.

That’s just one of the new normals for Ireland women’s rugby skipper Ciara Griffin, under the IRFUs Covid-19 protocols designed to keep the virus out of the national team camp.

Without the professional structures of the men’s set up, the women’s squad are traveling independently and have been doing so for the last few weeks as training camps took place ahead of next week’s fourth Six Nations game, against Italy in Dublin.

Training and travel ‘pods’ are the name of the game, and when confined in the smaller quarters of a car, the message is: mask up and windows down.

“We’re traveling independently so we have some travel pods,” explained Griffin. “We all follow Covid precautions, wear masks, and keep the windows down.

“It’s chilly enough but it’s a small price to play. You need to make sure you’re not taking risks.

“It is different overall, it’s not the way we were training in march. But I have to commend the IRFU, we do a Covid assessment every morning, we write down everything. We have temperature checks after training, we sign in and sign out....use our own bottles etc... all the procedures are there to keep us safe.”

Griffin, a UL Bohs player, has been training with club and country, but has been limited to internal training games ahead of next Sunday’s international.

As amateur players, they have been denied the same support as their professional counterparts in the male game, but the player refuses to agree they are making greater sacrifices in their personal life.

“That word, to be honest, I don’t think they’re really sacrifices,” she argued. “You decide to put that time in, to do those sessions, to get the green jersey.

“We’re taking that extra responsibility outside of camp, staying in your own bubbles, work bubbles, or social bubbles, because you have to limit things, to be extra careful. You don’t want any external distractions to take away from the performances.”

Ireland last played a game in February, a 27-0 defeat to England in London — a result that brought a shuddering halt to the dream of a Grand Slam, following two opening wins.

Little did the players know then that the visit of Italy would be so far away, and little did school teacher Griffin realise how different life would be in the intervening months.

“It’s mad — I’ve got very used to using Microsoft Teams as well,” she said, on yet another video conference, with journalists instead of pupils.

“With lockdown and teaching it was a very busy few months, like everyone — we’re all adopting to the new normal.”

Rugby players like to say the great thing about the game is that a defeat is always followed by another game that offers a shot at redemption, but how did sitting for eight months on a heavy defeat feel?

“It hasn’t stuck in our minds, really,” Griffin said. “We kept them scoreless in second half, we had a few defensive blips in the first half but I was really proud with our work rate in the last 40 minutes.

“So I wouldn’t put in the back of our mind, we have to learn from every performance, and that’s built into our camps now, and we’re looking forward to the next game out.”

Italy and France are next up, with key Rugby World Cup qualifiers to come in December, and with Griffin’s rescheduled wedding scheduled just before Christmas too, it’s quite a busy time for the Kerry native.

“You want to win all your matches on home soil and we’ve two left — and it’s great to have our first game in so long at home,” she said.

“We want to win three home matches this Six Nations, and they’re also two really important matches building up for December. We want to keep up that good work we’ve put in camp, and get a performance to match.”

- Canterbury, the official kit partner to Irish Rugby, has officially launched the new Ireland Women’s Rugby Home jersey that will be worn throughout the 2020/21 season. The jersey can be purchased from today in selected Intersport Elvery’s stores nationwide, at IrishRugby.ie and at Canterbury.com.