Johnny Sexton insists this Ireland team won't be weighed down by history in tomorrow's World Cup quarter-final with the All Blacks.
Ireland have never progressed beyond this stage in the tournament and, at the ninth attempt at doing so, they must overcome the back to back world champions to change that.
"Of course we'd like it to be better but it is what it is," said Sexton, reflecting on the eve of the clash on Ireland's history of heartbreak and disappointment.
"There's nothing we can do about previous results now.
"All we can do now is concentrate on putting in our best performance tomorrow. It'll give us a chance and if we can walk off that pitch tomorrow having played our best, give it everything, we can look at ourselves afterwards no matter what.
"That's what we focus on. The record at the tournament, it's not something that we've overly spoken about.
"Of course we know we can make history, we can create something a little bit special if we can do that.
"But, yeah, I can't really speak about Ireland's record because it's been a different team every time."
Sexton admits that Ireland may take more conservative action to keep the scoreboard ticking over than they have over the past month in Japan.
Remarkably, only one of their scores has come from a penalty, with the emphasis on going for the jugular with kicks to the corner.
"We try and mix and match," argued the Leinster star.
"It will be a different game tomorrow and if three points are on offer, we'll look at them. It's all about how the game is going".
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