Anger in Ireland, joy unconfined in Japan. Given its relevance and circumstances, this victory possibly even eclipses the Brave Blossoms’ famous win over the Springboks four years ago. That was the Brighton Miracle. This was the Shizuoka Shock, and how they joyously and deservedly celebrated it.
At a stroke the Brave Blossoms assumed centre stage in Japan’s sporting mindset like never before. Until the very eve of the tournament, sumo wrestling especially along with baseball and football held sway in their sports pages. Judging by a collage of pictures with the players in celebratory mode following this historic win, Japan’s rugby team dominated the front and back pages, and much more besides.
The celebrations continued far and wide beyond this superb stadium. Privately, World Rugby and the tournament organisers must have been in raptures as well. The 2019 World Cup has had lift off.
Nowadays everything has to be the greatest or the worst, but to describe this as even one of Ireland’s worst performances or results in history does a further disservice to a Japanese performance which would have beaten most teams at this World Cup. It also overlooks a weighty historical tome which would beg to differ.
Meanwhile, the Irish squad slunk further south along the coast to Kobe in readiness for Thursday’s meeting with Russia (kick-off 7.15pm local time/8.15am Irish) to lick their wounds, and they’ve plenty of them, physical and mental.
Jack Conan's tournament is cruelly over, Chris Farrell has been ruled out of the Russian game with concussion, Rob Kearney is a doubt after passing his HIA 2 and Robbie Henshaw is still being monitored after suffering a hamstring injury in the week of the Scottish game.
Ireland's backrow and midfield look especially thin, with Simon Easterby strongly intimating that Jordi Murphy will be pitched straight into the action after arriving yesterday, while at least Bundee Aki should be straining at the leash.
And Johnny is back. Jack Carty did many things well before suffering along with everyone else, and with just 50 minutes of game time since May, Joey Carbery looked rusty. But Sexton needs game time too, and not for the first time, Ireland need him too.
The World Player of the Year effectively confirmed his fitness, and ability to reassume the place-kicking duties after overcoming the quad strain which prevented him from doing so after the first quarter of the Scottish game.
“Yeah, yeah, that’s the plan anyway. Some of the thinking behind last week was that when I picked up that knock, it made kicking a big risk for the rest of that game. I was aware of it on some of the hang kicks, when you need to be 100 per cent. I kicked a little bit this morning and trained with the physios again today, and hopefully [I will] train fully on Tuesday.”
Senior player
Sexton or, if he is picked again, Peter O’Mahony are likely to captain a much changed team, and Sexton said: “With a five-day turnaround, it’s probably a good thing this week. Guys want to get on the pitch as soon as possible.
“A week is a long time in sport – how high we were last week to how low we were today and we want to get back on the other side of that as soon as possible. We can take the hurt into this week a little bit but it’s going to stay with us until the end of this tournament.”
Even when tearing it up against Scotland, Sexton’s mere presence helps to organise those around him and make them play better. Now the onus is on him and others to be called in for their first World Cup starts to do so.
“When you’re a senior player in the group that’s your job all the time, even more so when you’ve come off the back of a very disappointing defeat. I think the team will be very different this week but ultimately you’ve got to pick 23 from 31 so there are going to be guys who are backing up three games. That’s the nature of a World Cup.
“We’ve had it on the Lions tours where you’ve had to play three games in a week. So it can sometimes be tough. But at other times you can get into a bit of a rhythm and a routine and the games can work out in your favour. Hopefully I’ll get to go out this Thursday with the boys and we can put in a performance we can be proud of, and more importantly, put us in a good position to get into the quarter final.”
Nor was their motivation to prove the doubters wrong.
“You’re always going to have doubters in this game but ultimately you want to do everyone proud, you want to make the people of Ireland proud, you want to make your family watching at home proud and, yeah, ultimately the guys that you’re closest to are you teammates.
“The guys gave it everything yesterday. No one can deny that and no one can point the finger and say there was a lack of effort. It was wholehearted,” said Sexton, who maintained of their review: “It’s small things and we’ll fix them up.”
