NEW ZEALAND’S GREAT Barrier Island, located around 100 kilometers north-east of Auckland, may only have a population of about 900 residents but that’s still enough to sustain a small Irish bar and an annual St Patrick’s Day parade.
You can be sure many of those who turn out to celebrate the occasion this weekend will be up at 6am local time Sunday to tune into events on this side of the world, keen to see how Jamison Gibson-Park gets on as Ireland take on England in their St Patrick’s weekend Six Nations finale in Dublin.
The Ireland scrum-half’s parents now live on the mainland but he still has plenty of family on Great Barrier Island. Half the world away, Gibson-Park is hoping to give them a morning to remember as he gears up for one of the biggest weeks of his career.
Ireland’s last Grand Slam success came two years before Gibson-Park was first capped at Test level. The Leinster player watched on from a distance as Joe Schmidt’s charges got over the line at Twickenham and started to dream about one day being part of a winning Test team. He’s now just one game away from tasting Grand Slam glory.
“I suppose I was lucky enough to witness 2018,” Gibson-Park says. “It just looked unbelievable. It would have been an awesome thing to be a part of. I suppose ever since then (it was in my head).
“It blossomed over the years. It was the same thing with Chicago in 2016 and all these things. I was sitting there thinking ‘It would be pretty awesome to be part of this.’”
Gibson-Park didn’t feature in this year’s Six Nations until Sunday’s defeat of Scotland, a hamstring issue which he had hoped would clear up in time for the start of tournament proving more tricky than initially hoped.
The 31-year-old finally got a chance to lace up his boots when sent in for Conor Murray with 21 minutes to play at Murrayfield, his introduction quickly lifting the tempo as Ireland killed the game with tries from James Lowe and Jack Conan.
“I was just ready to get out there,” he continues, admitting he was happy to hit the ground running after such a long time out. “It was just one of those days where literally anything could happen and we adapted pretty well.”
The early rounds of the championship proved a difficult time for Gibson-Park, who was glad to see his team roll through the opening three rounds unbeaten but frustrated to be restricted to a watching brief, the injury different to the hamstring problem that ruled him out of the start of the season.
It was a tough one, probably the toughest injury break I’ve had, to be honest. Normally I just get on with things, it’s part of the game, just get stuck into the rehab process, but this one was pretty tough.
“Knowing how good a side we’ve got and how good of a chance we had to go pretty well, so it was definitely a little bit tougher than normal watching on.”
He credits Einar Einarsson, a relatively new addition to the Irish Rugby staff working under the title of specialist rehab physio, with helping him return to action in top shape.
“We’ve got a new guy Einar (Einarsson), the master of movement from Iceland. He has been great with the rehab for myself, Tadhg (Furlong), Robbie (Henshaw), Johnny (Sexton), all these guys rehabbing injuries.
“It’s been awesome to work with him, he’s brought a bit of a different perspective. But yeah, in the same breath, I’ve been involved with the team a little bit.
“It’s all about strengthening around the area. Einar, he’s been unbelievable from that perspective. He has worked in professional basketball and a number of sprinters and footballers and stuff, so he has a different perspective.
He has been awesome for me and the guys. To be honest, I’ve probably never felt better, so it’s all going pretty well, the rehab all went to plan, and happy with how things are.”
Gibson-Park’s return is timely given the extensive injury list Andy Farrell is now working with, having seen Caelan Doris, Dan Sheehan, Iain Henderson, Rónan Kelleher and Garry Ringrose all forced off on Sunday.
“We’re trying to just field a team at this stage! But yeah a few niggles and a few injuries. It’s obviously been a tough campaign, we’ve had a number of pretty along the way, so it’s been pretty low key.
“We got back on Sunday night, pretty chilled day yesterday and into a bit more work today (Tuesday), but pretty much the one training day for the week, with it obviously being a short turnaround.
“In a sense, it kind of feels like we have been here before. In a few ways, it feels similar to the last week in New Zealand (last summer), where we probably didn’t have as many injuries, but it was the end of a long season or a long campaign. It’s about looking after the bodies and getting the minds right.”
The latter part should be no issue for Gibson-Park. After all, it was weeks like these that drove him to reach this stage.
“You feed off it (the occasion) certainly, get the work done early and then start building to the weekend but we try to be as process-driven as we can and focus on the game rather than the occasion.
“They (England) will be hurting. They obviously haven’t seen that happen in Twickenham before (biggest ever home defeat) so they will be desperate to turn that round which will make them difficult to play against. The tempo is a crucial thing for our game and we’ll try to implement it as best we can.”
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