Updated 15.00
THIS WEEK, I want to just start by saying that myself and all the other players really appreciate all the support we’ve got in the Six Nations so far, especially last weekend around the English game.
Over 300,000 people tuned into RTÉ to watch the match and there’s going to be close to 60,000 people in the Aviva in two weekends’ time for the game against Italy, so there’s no reason why they can’t stay behind. The support is driving us on every week.
The loss to England is a difficult one to figure out. Straight after the game, I was just dazed, wondering what went wrong. On the pitch, it felt like the hardest game we’ve ever played, from start to finish. The physicality was just at another level.
I got selected for a random drugs test after the game and I was just sitting in the little room not even knowing what to think. It’s hard to remember all the little details that happened in the game and you can’t really analyse it too closely right then.
On Sunday I made myself watch the game to help me order my thoughts; it’s a very strange scenario, because even though you were so centrally involved, you can’t remember the ins and outs of what happened.
Watching it back, I was a bit angry because it didn’t actually look as bad as it felt on the day. We’ll just have to take the positives as we move on from the disappointment. We made lots of mistakes, but we can pinpoint those errors and work out how to avoid making them again.
I think we’ll learn more from that match than any other game we’ve played. It was the most amount of pressure that we’ve ever been under in a game and we kept going right until the end, despite the two yellow cards and a mountain of penalties conceded.
Our performance wasn’t good enough and we know we can do better. I think England’s experience of playing so many high level games like that one was the ultimate difference at the end of the day; we are still learning that.
We’re going to analyse our discipline in depth ahead of the Italy clash. England are so powerful, but even when they did get over the gainline, it was only by a metre or two. They were strong, but some of our own rucking was good, so I don’t think it was a case of simply conceding penalties as we tried to scramble against their ball carrying power.
Some of the decisions against us were very confusing. We just didn’t really know what was going on with some of the penalties, because they were coming from left, right and centre.
We probably needed to read the referee a little better. She wasn’t great for us, but she wasn’t great for England either. I don’t think the referee was the making or losing of the game by any means. At the end of the day, not having our hands on the ball enough was what let us down.
We’re gutted, but it’s just one game; there are two hugely important fixtures to come and there’s a championship on the line. Italy is going to be a huge, huge task as they really grow in confidence every single time they play. They’re gathering a lot of experience and using it well.
There’s another rest weekend ahead, and it is nice to have a bit of a break. Some of the girls will take the chance to go home to their families, or head to events with their friends. Sometimes it’s good to step out of that Six Nations bubble and back into reality, see people, chill out and gather your energy.
Having said that, everyone will be keeping an eye on their training and mentally preparing themselves for Italy. We don’t have a squad session this weekend, but a lot of your training takes place in the head. You go over what you didn’t do in the last game, what you’ll implement in the next game, just visualizing different scenarios.
We’re obviously playing Italy in the Aviva Stadium, and having played in Twickenham has probably got the big stadium nervousness out of the system. It’s fantastic because an awful lot of people have been telling us that they’ll be turning up for the game in Dublin.
We have buses coming from all over the country, I think we have 50 at last count. For anyone else who wants to take up that offer, they just need to email in and apply for that.
It’s going to be a great occasion and we can’t wait for the chance to get back to winning ways.
Nora Stapleton is the Leinster and Ireland out-half. You can follow her on Twitter. Nora made her debut against Italy in 2010 and was part of the Grand Slam-winning team in 2013.
Ireland Women face Italy on Saturday the 8th of March at the Aviva Stadium, with kick-off at 5.00pm.
