IF ANDY FARRELL is feeling any of the pressure that can come with wearing the tag of being the top ranked team in world rugby, he’s doing a good job of hiding it.
On the banks of the Thames on a frosty London morning, the Ireland head coach cut a relaxed figure at Monday’s Guinness Six Nations launch; cracking jokes, slipping dodgy puns into his answers and interrupting questions aimed at his captain, Johnny Sexton.
The message was loud and clear. Pressure? What pressure?
Most of the talking was done in a packed media room where the assembled press packs huddled up alongside the roving cameras on site to capture early footage for a Netflix documentary series due to air early next year.
Shortly before lunch, in a quiet corner of the vast County Hall, Farrell held court with a smaller group of the travelling Irish press to briefly reflect on a superb 2022 for his Ireland team, before looking ahead to the biggest year of his coaching career.
All roads lead to the 2023 World Cup in France but first up, there’s an intriguing Six Nations to negotiate. Farrell believes his team can build on the heights they hit last year but is reluctant to measure their growth on whether or not they capture silverware this spring.
“We will be honest enough with ourselves to see where we are at,” Farrell said.
“I know that we could have all the ambition in the world to finish number one, but in reality, we could still improve as a team and finish number two etc.
But the lads are desperate to be successful and win. That’s the next thing that’s in front of us and how people perform and how we deal with that as a group will grow us to be able to pick the right squad (for the World Cup) and we know the type of characters, whether they are growing or not with the rest of the season, and then we roll into pre-season.
“We finally get to have the players for a full summer and hopefully make some big improvements before the World Cup starts.”
Much can change between now and then – as demonstrated by Farrell’s decision to leave Joey Carbery out of his squad for the early rounds of this Six Nations. Carbery’s current position in the Ireland out-half conversation was high on the agenda yesterday – second only to the condition of Johnny Sexton’s cheek bone.
“They’re all difficult (decisions), but that’s my job, to make the call for what is right for the team,” Farrell explained. “Sometimes what’s right for the team is a very difficult conversation to have.
“But at the same time, we’ve got good people and Joey is one those. He’ll do everything he can to get back into the room.
Like I’ve always said to you, I’ve been saying this for the last three years – competition for places has to be our best friend and the reality is that it’s getting tougher and tougher to select squads now. That’s exactly where we want to be and we can’t shy away from that.
“Look, I personally would like to keep the conversation that I had with him private because it’s between me and him,” Farrell continued.
“Obviously he knows what he needs to work on in his game. I give feedback to everyone else in the squad as well and that will stay the same. I thought he went well (for Munster against Toulouse). I know there will be a good reaction from him and that’s what we are ultimately trying to achieve.
“We are after people competing against each other. I asked Ross (Byrne) to do the same over the last couple of years, and he’s been doing that. He deserves a chance to show that he can transfer that onto the international stage.
“Joey will go away and work unbelievably hard to get back in the room and I’ve no doubt, he’ll give us even more headaches further down the track.”
Carbery’s absence has opened the door for Ross Byrne to further his case following his nerveless match-winning penalty against the Wallabies in November. Farrell has seen improvements in Byrne’s overall game and made a point of singling out the 27-year-old’s leadership qualities.
“I think his game control has been excellent,” Farrell said of Byrne. “Not just that, I think he’s playing flatter to the line and is more connected with the other players. I think he’s been squarer to the line and his running game at the weekend (against Racing) was excellent. He always keeps the team moving forward. He’s on top of all that.
“He’s got a real sense of how to grab hold of a side and make sure that people know that he’s in charge. There’s probably no better game to watch that than when he came on against the Ospreys. It was magnificent to the eye, how he galvanised the group and got them forward to the victory. It was pretty good to see.”
Carbery’s omission aside, Farrell’s squad now has a settled, familiar look to it, with Leinster’s Jamie Osborne the only uncapped player in the 37-man selection.
Johnny Sexton and Tadhg Furlong are both set to be available for Ireland’s opening fixture against Wales on 4 February. James Lowe – who recently returned to New Zealand for personal reasons – is also available and Farrell is hopeful of having Robbie Henshaw back for the latter stages of the competition as he steps up his recovery from a wrist injury.
Ireland signed off for a superb 2022 with three wins from three in November, but across all three performances against the Springboks, Fiji and Australia, Farrell identified areas his team can target for improvement across the coming weeks and months.
“We lost our way in certain games (in November) but the good thing about it is we found a way to get back and win, so getting back in sync a little bit with our attack, showing some good ambition and playing the game that’s in front of us is always going to be key.
“We know where we need to go and where we’re concentrating ourselves before the Wales game. But having said that, one area that we have been working really hard on is the mental side of our game and keeping our composure nice and calm, especially when things aren’t going our way.
“There were tough battles in the autumn, especially the South Africa and Australia games but we did find a way, which is a skill in itself.”
We all know what happened the last time an Irish team entered a World Cup year in this position. Can Farrell be the coach to lift Ireland to new heights?
Deep breaths. Nice and calm.
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