It’s funny how small things accumulate to produce a pivotal moment in a match. Ross Byrne’s pinpoint crossfield kick on 69 minutes that squeezed France back into their 22, chipping away at their resolve as they tried to figure out how they were going to turn around a six-point deficit from the immediacy of the visitors’ try-line.
Antoine Dupont cleared and as befits a side that has Shaun Edwards as their defence coach, the kick-chase was aggressive as they sought to swarm the recipient, Mack Hansen. While Ireland’s right wing was a little less conspicuous or effective than normal in an attacking capacity, he retained a connection to his team-mates.
In this instance, Hansen broke the first tackle and in doing so kick-started a period of pressure that would ultimately lead to Garry Ringrose’s bonus-point try, one that transformed a potentially nervy end game into a more relaxing spin to the final whistle based on a 13-point buffer.
In the build-up to the match, it was funny to observe how Irish people squirm when confronting the tag of favouritism, no matter how merited the honour. It is treated with deep-rooted scepticism to a point where to acknowledge it is to risk misfortune.
It partially explains why, depending on perspective, Saturday’s Test match represented the number one and two ranked teams going head-to-head, or the best team in the world, France, based on a 14-match winning streak and their status as Grand Slam champions taking on the “underdogs” Ireland.
We Irish love to plámás our opponents. I would need more than two hands to count the number of people that said the list of missing players would be fatal to Ireland’s chances of winning, whereas France rocked up to the Aviva Stadium full sure that they were going to win the match.
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There was very little between the teams on the scoreboard, one score, six points, going into the final 10-minutes. The way the game panned out reflects the philosophy of the respective coaches, Andy Farrell and Fabien Galthié and their playing squads.
France were very much in Championship or World Cup mode, a set-up and attitude they have championed for some time now. They have opted to take three points about 70 per cent of the time from kickable penalties; Thomas Ramos’s final tally of three penalties and a drop goal – he also kicked a conversion – emphasised that approach.
The French team has generated huge expectations based on results and that coupled with being the home side at the World Cup will prompt a deep dive to establish why they lost to Ireland. It is not the defeat per se but the manner of it that might cause a little concern in the short-term. Should it? No, not really unless it becomes a pattern.
What’s interesting to watch over the last two or three seasons with France is the way they embraced an attacking philosophy that made the rugby playing audience stand up and take notice. There were aspects of it on show at the Aviva, as they occasionally broke the shackles of rigorous and largely excellent Irish defence.
However, they were a little more conservative in mindset, a fact reflected in their kicking game. There were times when Ireland kicked poorly and in the past that would have been the signal for France to attack ball-in-hand, but instead the visitors just booted it back for the most part.
There were exceptions, Dupont probing around the fringes was always dangerous and on one occasion it took a smart read from Josh van der Flier to intercept what could have been a try-scoring offload.
Damian Penaud’s try was a contradiction to the visitors’ kick heavy patterns, but it was borne out of chaos and not preordained. It reminded everyone that there are few better teams in world rugby when it comes to going off script to ad-lib a response.
It was a brief glimpse that got me wondering whether focusing on the result is impacting the French performance. Is that balance wrong perhaps? “Heavy is the head that wears the crown” they say and yet for Ireland today it doesn’t appear to be weighing down the coaches and players.
The belief in the game plan is clear, obvious, and cold eyed in contrast to nervous excitement of the supporters. What I was consistently interested in at the weekend was the way Ireland dealt with the momentum battles, and on balance won this very important metric as well.
Immediately after conceding a try, Ireland attacked the restart, and albeit with a bit of luck, regained possession, a forerunner to an impressive “try” for James Lowe. It is easy to say that Ireland focuses on tries, but I think it is more fundamental than that. I think the tries are a natural byproduct of the way they are playing.
There were two different approaches from Ireland and France at the weekend, the home side looking to create soft shoulders rather than seeking contact, while the visitors chose to be muscular and direct during phase play.
The stats tell an interesting tale. Ireland had 56 per cent possession, passed the ball 182 times to the opponent’s 125, and won 135 rucks to France’s 77. A key metric a lot of people focused on was the volume of missed Irish tackles, 34 of 140 made. The French made over 240 tackles and missed 22.
What was key to the Irish success was where on the pitch when they were missing the tackles; Ireland played just 8 per cent of the match in their own 22 compared to France’s 25 per cent. The Irish plan did not change because certain players were missing. They were clear in their approach, using footwork, timing, passing – with very good decisions behind most passes to move a bigger team around the field.
They relied heavily on good basic skills, an ability to get over the gainline and the speed and accuracy of their work at the breakdown. James Ryan has been superb in this aspect of the Irish attack, enjoying the odd inside ball from Johnny Sexton to change up their attack shape, and his ruck work has been a vital component of the Irish plan.
A natural tendency has always been to look at what is missing rather than what we have, and perhaps that will always be the way, but when Caelan Doris, Garry Ringrose and Hugo Keenan are playing we should begin to think more positively from the outset rather than retrospectively acknowledging their excellence.
Keenan quietly delivered another impressive display, making the hard aspects of the position look ridiculously easy. Doris epitomised everything that was good about the Irish performance, footwork into contact or good crisp passes flat at the line. It was his impact at the breakdown which time and again slowed down the French ruck speed, all under the gaze of a watchful Wayne Barnes.
The Irish backrower had three offloads, all perfectly executed, but two of them highlighting his growing impact on the game and his ability to read a match.
Watching Shane Byrne on Dancing with the Stars, while trying to figure out how the seamstress manages to keep his physique tucked away, he paid a lovely tribute to the late Anthony Foley and it got me thinking that about how Axel invariably chose the right time and the right place to make the maximum impact.
Doris arrived at two rucks, instinctively knew he could increase the tempo and backed his own skill set to get the passes away, releasing Lowe in the first instance and then Ringrose for the match-winning try. Had the Mayo man sought contact rather than relying on his innate footwork the offloads would probably not have materialised.
He fought through Gael Fickou’s tackle to get his hands free and the excellent Ringrose delivered the coup de grace. The Irish players are consistently in tune with one another, and I think the bigger question is how they are managing to maintain this. I believe it starts with Andy Farrell and the environment he is facilitating and one which the players create.
I consistently go back to the philosophy that coaching is less about tactics and more about coaching the person behind the player. The performance of the Irish team is primarily insulated from what the opposition is doing in the way Ireland have stayed in matches and maintained their attacking approach: keep passing, keep looking for soft shoulders, keep generating quick ball and the result will look after itself.
This mindset has taken time to develop, benefiting from Farrell’s no-nonsense approach. He is an open book in a lot of ways, embracing the challenges that come, injuries, buses being late, maybe even trying to generate a bit more chaos off the field to test the players’ resolve.
As a player I can remember responding to coaches at different times, Joe Schmidt at Leinster where he thrived with the continual engagement with people and Declan Kidney at various times in my career. Farrell and his coaching team are a special group of people, and we should enjoy them as long as we have them. Farrell is proof that if you coach the person then great things will follow.
