Mike Catt: 'Get over what’s happened in the past and let’s go and do it'

HEALTHY RIVALRY: Ireland attack coach Mike Catt wants Irish players to put club disappointments behind them for their upcoming games against South Africa. Pic: ©INPHO/Tom Maher

Ireland players heading to South Africa have been told to let their provincial disappointments go and get on with the job of trying to beat the Springboks next month.

The back-to-back Guinness Six Nations champions will fly to Johannesburg on Tuesday ahead of a two-Test series with the 2019 and 2023 World Cup winners, the first of which is in Pretoria at Loftus Versfeld on July 6.

Ireland attack coach Mike Catt wants the 35-player squad to forget the pain of URC semi-final losses for both Munster and Leinster, a quarter-final defeat for Ulster and Connacht failing to make the play-offs as head coach Andy Farrell bids to claim a first series victory on South African soil in the coming weeks.

The assistant coach on Monday described the mood in the Irish camp as far from downbeat.

“For us it was fine, we’ve got an extra two days to perform,” Catt said. “So get over it and let’s get up and go again.

“I think you have to understand that this squad has been around a long time now. They fully understand, as do the coaches, what it’s about.

“You don’t dwell, you don’t mope around, you get on with it and like I say, the challenge is real for us, so it’s about making sure we put our best foot forward and go and perform.

“Get over what’s happened in the past and let’s go and do it.

“We won’t touch on the past. We will just go on what we have now. We need the energy, we need the boys at their very, very best to compete against South Africa. It’s making sure that they are up to speed in everything they do.” 

Catt reported a fully fit squad in camp at the IRFU High Performance Centre in west Dublin after a couple of players sat out training last week following those knockout defeats, Leinster having returned from Pretoria having lost to the Bulls.

It was a defeat that also cost Ireland the services of scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park who returned to Dublin with a season-ending hamstring injury yet Catt insisted the absence of the first-choice number nine would not force a change in playing style with Conor Murray, Craig Casey and Caolin Blade set to vie for the starting spot.

“What we have got is Craig and Mur and Bladey that has come in again. These guys have been around camp for the past three, four years or 12 or 15 years whatever Mur has been around.

"It’s not going to change anything in terms of how we do things, it just gives those other guys an opportunity again to cement their place going forward.” 

Ireland have beaten the Springboks in their last three meetings, twice in Dublin and most recently in last autumn’s pool stages at the World Cup in France. Yet it was the South Africans who had the last laugh by successfully defending their title while the then-top-ranked Irish were sent packing by New Zealand in the quarter-finals.

Barbed comments about Ireland from double World Cup winners Eben Etzebeth, Damien de Allende and Cheslin Kolbe in the build-up to this summer’s series suggest they are eager to stoke the fires ahead of their first home matches since lifting the Webb Ellis Cup but Catt described the rivalry as a healthy one when asked about it on Monday.

“The rivalry's been good, that's what you want at Test level, it's why you play the game. We've been pretty successful over the past three times we've played them, they're chomping at the bit.

“There's been a lot said in the press and this and that, it's getting rid of all the white noise, what's important for us is to put in a hell of a performance, and go and challenge to win a series down in South Africa.

“It's healthy, you want that rivalry. You want that - not hatred - but whatever it is that stirs it all up. It's good.”