It was when the pain of defeat was at its worst that plans were first drawn up to ensure there would be no hangover following Ireland’s World Cup quarter-final defeat in Paris.
The day after the 28-24 defeat to New Zealand last October, Ireland coach Andy Farrell gathered his squad and their families to enjoy a day together to honor the contributions and sacrifices made over the past five months .
The event was intended to let the players let off steam, but also included discussions between Farrell and David Nucifora, the Irish Rugby Football Union’s performance director, about the next steps forward.
“We just had a few beers,” Nucifora recalls. “I think it was mostly about enjoying each other’s company. Since there was a group and families it was great. It’s something Andy really focuses on. It is very important for him to have his family close by and by extension the group and the IRFU have been really supportive of that.
“We had a day to enjoy each other’s company after the pressure of the build-up. We knew what we had to do. There is nothing false about what we do. We are driven, we are determined. It’s happening. It was clear to us that when we came back in, we would continue working.
“One of the standout things about the World Cup was the connection the team had with the Irish crowd. The support they received in France was incredible. If there was a sense of disappointment individually as a team, there was also a sense of disappointment for the fans.
“Everyone is different and some of the boys handled it differently, but when we got back together we talked about the campaign, assessed it and they just moved on to the next challenge ahead. Teams talk all the time about wanting to get better, but this team really does and they couldn’t wait to get back to it.”
With the tone set for that meeting in Paris, Farrell gathered his coaches not long after their return to Ireland. His instinct was to keep going. After a seventeen-game winning streak, the margins of defeat were so small against the All Blacks. This was not the time to pull out all the stops at the start of a new four-year World Cup cycle.
Nucifora’s review of the campaign underlined Farrell’s sentiment. The former Wallaby hooker and head coach at the ACT Brumbies and Auckland Blues, who laid the foundations for Ireland’s success by overhauling their centrally controlled high-performance program after his arrival in 2014, revealed he and Farrell had spoken daily in France with real-time feedback.
“I’m not a fan of those big ‘look back’ reviews months later because it’s too late. We learn as we go and apply those lessons to what we do today, tomorrow and next week. We think about that in similar ways, so there is trust between us on how we operate and that allows us to keep moving forward,” Nucifora said.
One of the criticisms is that Ireland relied too heavily on a core group that played all four group matches, as well as the quarter-final defeat, in a five-week period.
“At the time we felt like it was the right thing to do because no one knows the group better than the group itself, so we knew the selections we made were the right ones,” Nucifora emphasized. “We would have had real confidence in the fitness of our players. You see the way we play the game. It’s a credit to our staff for getting the players in the shape they are in for the coaches. All our players can play the way we want to play.
“There are little things we’ve learned along the way on the field, things we’ve talked about that are probably not for public consumption.
“In this business you have to be adaptable and adaptable, and you have to make decisions based on what’s in front of you, in the here and now. I think that’s the real strength of this team: the way we play, the kind of players we have, the skills we can deliver. I think Andy would be proud and the team is proud that they can deal with any conditions.
“That is a very important indicator of what they stand for, the resilience they show. They have so much confidence in each other as players and in their coaches and staff. They just dusted themselves off and moved on, and that’s what they did after the World Cup.”
The appointment of 34-year-old Peter O’Mahony to succeed Johnny Sexton as Ireland captain made a statement about the desire for continuity, while Farrell set his sights on backing their Grand Slam triumph last season and told his coaching team : “Go make it happen.”
“Peter earned the right with his performance and the respect,” Nucifora added. “It was a mutual evolution for the team. How long he stays in the role will depend on his performance. Ultimately, things will unfold and it will become clear how to proceed, rather than trying to premeditate things.”
With such a solid foundation, the introduction of new players such as Jack Crowley, Joe McCarthy, Ciaran Frawley and Calvin Nash has proven seamless, an evolution made easier by the fact that they have been integrated into the wider squad in recent years. a few years. When competition for places has never been fiercer, Farrell’s masterstroke is creating an environment that’s also fun. “Nobody wants to miss anything,” Nucifora added.
The Australian’s involvement in Irish rugby is coming to an end after ten years. His latest involvement will be overseeing the Ireland Sevens teams at the Olympic Games in Paris this summer. He has been instrumental in prioritizing the Sevens program in a country where 15-a-side was king. But perhaps his greatest legacy has been a change in mentality.
“I am proud of how the Irish team thinks and behaves,” he added. “It is the legacy they built that has cut through the Irish system. We have now had a number of years where our young players have seen the senior team consistently beat the top teams in the world.
“When I arrived the mentality was ‘well we’ve never beaten New Zealand, we’ve never won in South Africa, we’ve never won a series in Australia or New Zealand’. That shift in the way the Irish think about their ability to win is the most important thing. We’ve changed the way they think about themselves and what they’re capable of. They now feel comfortable being the best and have the expectation to win. In the past, Ireland was not good at that.”