IRISH RUGBY is used to being the underdog. Underdogs usually lose; hence the name, but lately this particular one has been busily erasing decades of disappointments, slaying not just Goliath but also his brothers.
Over the last 13 years there have been two grand slams, two further Six Nations championships, a series win in Australia against the Wallabies, a first away win over the Springboks and of course the banishing of an All Black ghost in Chicago.
They haven’t stopped there. In 2018, they defeated the All Blacks on home soil for the first time; in 2021 they proved it wasn’t a fluke. Next came Saturday in Dunedin – the first time an Irish side has beaten New Zealand away, just the sixth time any team has been able to make that boast.
To place Saturday’s 23-12 victory in its proper context, it is the biggest home defeat the All Blacks have suffered in the professional era, and now, six days out from the deciding test of this series, you have to examine the logbook to reveal how big a deal this is.
Only four teams have ever won a series against the All Blacks on New Zealand soil: Australia twice, the Springboks once – back in 1937 – the British and Irish Lions and France. So, when Johnny Sexton called Saturday’s win ‘a small result compared to something bigger being at stake’ – we know where he is coming from.
The Lions and Springboks have played 18 series here between them. Those Goliaths won one each. That’s how hard it is to win down here. If this Irish team do it on Saturday, they can etch their name into the record books.
“Ever since we met up a couple of weeks ago, we talked about creating a bit of history – so to be the first Irish team to win over here is really special,” said Hugo Keenan, the Ireland full-back. “It is great to even up things in the series but even better to put ourselves in a position to go on and make even more history.”
Keenan was barefoot as he spoke to us, still kitted out in his Ireland jersey, the cool of a Dunedin winter biting into his bones. We spoke in the concrete corridor that circled around this beautiful arena, gusts of wind periodically making its way past us.
We actually cut the interview short when he started to shiver – yet it wasn’t just the weather that marks him out as a cool customer. He’s 26. He’s played the All Blacks three times and has won twice. It took Ireland 111 years to record their first win.
That was the point Paul O’Connell made to Tadhg Beirne, James Ryan and Kieran Treadwell at the final whistle. “Lads I never beat these,” the former Ireland captain said. “Ye have done it twice.”
And yet the remarkable thing is it feels normal to this generation. If their predecessors in Irish jerseys were beaten before a ball was kicked, this current lot don’t know the meaning of an inferiority complex.
“We know when we perform that we can match anyone,” said Keenan.
There’s evidence to support his assertion. New Zealand twice, England twice, Wales three times, have been beaten since the last World Cup. That’s three of the four semi-finalists from that 2019 tournament.
Yet there is no over-the-top celebrations; no posing for photos. That’s not how it used to be. When Ireland defeated Australia in 2002, their first win over the Wallabies since 1979, Brian O’Driscoll took the players on a lap of honour.
On Saturday, by way of contrast, Sexton assembled the team in a huddle near the dressing room before they quietly made their way down the tunnel. It was as good as saying, ‘this is where we belong, what else did you expect’?
Here’s Keenan again: “We can do better,” he said, as if a 23-12 win in New Zealand was an underachievement. “Yeah, but we can be better,” he continued, eyebrows raised, a half-quizzical look on his face. “I mean we could have put a few more points on them today, we weren’t actually that clinical.”
That’s true. Ireland remember had a numerical advantage for 53 minutes of the match – and even had a two-man advantage for seven and a half minutes in the first half, when they failed to score. “We made life hard for ourselves,” Keenan said before reminding himself of what they’d actually done.
“Ah, it was great.”
Key to it was the fast start, he said, setting the tone, scoring early, making sure they didn’t repeat the mistakes of Eden Park when they twice knocked the ball on after crossing the line. Then on the other side of the ball, they curtailed the All Blacks’ counter-attacking game. Clinical? They were all that and more.
Suddenly, opportunity knocks. France were the last team to win a series here. That was 1994. Rugby was still an amateur sport then. The laws to award five points for a try rather than four had only just been amended a couple of years earlier. Samoa was Western Samoa; the Heineken Cup didn’t exist. Irish rugby was a joke.
“We set a target from day one to win this series,” says Keenan. “We have a lot belief in this squad and that has been shown in the last year or two.”
Where does that come from? “Our coaches,” he said, “the systems we play in; we have all bought in to how we want to play, in terms of the style. There is full buy in, there is trust.”
And there is this relentless pursuit of perfection. “For the number of times we were in their 22 we didn’t take the opportunities that were presented to us,” Sexton said. “That is where we need to be better.”
They have the chance to improve in Wellington … as well as writing their names into legend.