HOW SIGNIFICANT A factor will Joe Schmidt’s knowledge of Irish rugby be when Ireland and the All Blacks face off this weekend?
That was one of the matters for discussion on today’s Rugby Weekly Extra podcast.
Dan Leavy, the former Ireland international, says Schmidt has the expertise and motivation to have a bearing on the contest.
“I’d say Joe’s been prepping for this game ever since he joined the New Zealand ticket,” Leavy said.
“Joe has an unbelievable insight into a lot of the Irish coaches but also pretty much all of the players.
“He knows exactly how they play, what they try to do. So it is a big advantage to them. Do New Zealand want to leave all their faith in Joe? To come away from the rugby they play and look at the way Ireland used to play and try to break down Ireland like that?
“He will have them unbelievably well drilled. He will put up player profiles of our oppositions and have little notes on what they do, who carries, where they’re vulnerable and stuff like that. He’ll have them up all week of the Irish team. They go into some serious depth of analysis like that, and the fact that they have three or four days extra means they’ll really know their top trumps.”
The 42 rugby journalist Murray Kinsella said Schmidt’s input has been evident in areas such as New Zealand’s set-piece strike and kicking game. He said the Ireland team of today might resemble the version of Schmidt’s era in personnel, but in style they have long-since changed.
“He knows lots of Irish players, but this is a different Irish team to the one he coached – very, very different, with a different mindset, with a different approach to attacking, different approach to defending, different approach to everything really.”
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Kinsella added: “I have no doubt he’ll have some class starter plays to really test the Irish defence early on, because we saw again – if you get into phase against them, defensively they just love it, they lap it up.
“They’ve got breakdown threats in terms of counter-ruck, and jackal all over the place and they’re really smart in that decision making.
“You look at that 18-phase passage, they end up with 15 players on their feet just before they turn the Scots over, which that deep into a defensive set is remarkable really.”
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