Joe Schmidt does not care much for mind games. Asked if there was a bit of one-upmanship behind keeping his counterparts waiting in the rain for a group photograph to be taken at last week’s Six Nations launch, the New Zealander was perplexed. “I was eating a bacon sandwich,” he said.
Similarly, Schmidt brushed off Eddie Jones’s “grenade” that Ireland are favourites for the Six Nations with only half-hearted engagement: “We’ve got to come up with a clever riposte but we’re just not clever enough to do it that well.” Get him going on France though and the former Clermont coach speaks in depth about Ireland’s opening opponents on Saturday, reeling off how they are expected to line up with his trademark forensic precision.
For one of the reasons Schmidt does not like Ireland being anointed as favourites is the way in which his side were blown away in the first 30 minutes of their opening match last year at Murrayfield. “Last year we were incredibly disappointed with ourselves; we didn’t start well enough, giving Scotland a 21-5 head start,” Schmidt said. “If you are not on your game most teams in this competition will shred you pretty quickly. We know we have got to be nailed on.
“We will turn the page on to a full French focus and to try and find ways to unpick their defensive system and at the same time shore up our defensive system. It’s hard to predict the structure of what those threats might look like but we certainly know they have the individuals to do it.”
Ireland also failed to win their opening match two years ago – a draw at home to Wales – and as a result, Schmidt is looking no further than the trip to Paris. He broke from the norm by taking his squad for a warm weather training camp in Spain last week and while the public is sure to see some of the exciting youngsters at his disposal – headed by the 20-year-old Jordan Larmour – it may not be against France, rather at home to Italy in round two. “By the end of the tournament there will be two to three guys who you will be writing about who will be right up there and maybe they are not the ones we think right now,” Schmidt said. “A couple of players are going to emerge and make us say ‘wow’. We would love it if one was Jordan Larmour.”
The bookmakers do not agree with Jones – across the board they have England as favourites – but there is a growing consensus that Ireland pose the biggest threat to the two-times defending champions. Relatively speaking – because they are still without Sean O’Brien, Garry Ringrose, Rhys Ruddock and Jared Payne – they are less afflicted by injuries than their rivals, they blitzed the Springboks in their only real test in the autumn and their provinces are producing performances that have made the rest of Europe sit up and take note.
History is not on their side, however. Their record in Paris is dreadful, at Twickenham no better and those two fixtures bookend their campaign. Only once since a 21-year-old Brian O’Driscoll blazed a trail across the Stade de France turf in 2000 have Ireland beaten France away – four years ago when a jittery two-point win sealed the title.
The most recent Paris away day was a one-point defeat, when Johnny Sexton was singled out for some rough treatment and a monstrous France pack eventually won the day, while Schmidt pointedly made reference to a borderline disallowed try in Dublin last year that would have given Les Bleus an early 10-point advantage. “They are always complicated,” he added. “At the start of last year’s Six Nations they looked for a long time like they were going to beat England, that was a very late shift for England to get the result.”
This is Ireland’s youngest Six Nations squad but the one best equipped in terms of depth, and if that sounds contradictory it is best explained by their World Cup elimination in 2015. Schmidt’s side were badly exposed by injuries to key personnel in the quarter-final by Argentina and failed to recover in time for the subsequent Six Nations.
Ever since, Schmidt has stepped up his efforts to widen the talent pool and the resurgences of Leinster and Munster – and the number of homegrown players emerging at both clubs – would suggest he has succeeded to a considerable extent.
Jones may well have a point and if Ireland do end England’s reign, the influence of Stuart Lancaster (now at Leinster) and Andy Farrell (Ireland’s defence coach) cannot be overstated, nor the irony that would come with it. But Ireland continue to eschew the idea that their odds should be the shortest and it is perhaps unsurprising – they were the favourites to be awarded the 2023 World Cup not so long ago and that did not pan out so well. Considering it was France that beat them to it, there may be some added spice in Paris on Saturday.
