THOSE WHO WATCHED New Zealand and South Africa produce a thrilling Rugby Championship encounter last weekend might have felt a little fear at the prospect of their nation facing either of the two giants at the World Cup.
Rory Best was impressed by the fare on offer in Johannesburg, but he won’t be losing any sleep with concerns about Ireland’s ability to compete.
Joe Schmidt’s side could potentially meet the Kiwis at the quarter-final or final stages, though their only likely encounter with the Springboks is in the tournament decider on 31 October in Twickenham.
While Ireland and the rest of the Six Nations sides have been going through their pre-seasons since late June, the Rugby Championship has been closely observed.
Best feels New Zealand and South Africa aren’t the only potential World Cup contenders on view. He has serious respect for Michael Cheika’s ever-improving Australia, who Ireland could meet in a semi-final.
I think the Test match last weekend was a great spectacle and it seems to be every time New Zealand and South Africa play each other,” said Ulster captain Best. “There were aspects of it that were very, very impressive.
“Before the game even started you knew they are two teams that are going to be in contention. The one that not many people are talking about is Australia, but to show the mentality they showed to come back against South Africa (in the first round).
“Then to go to Argentina and win, in the end, reasonably comfortably – it says a lot. I think you saw it when Cheika came into Leinster the first time, in a team that everyone said needed a backbone to win things.
“They could never get a backbone and all of a sudden Cheika produced one. They went on and look what they’ve done in his era and beyond. You can nearly see elements of that with Australia in that they have the mental fortitude to come back and beat South Africa.”
It’s almost habit at this stage to rave about the All Blacks as the World Cup approaches, fear the physical power of the Boks and quiver at the thought of the Wallabies’ attacking riches.
However, Schmidt’s Ireland come into this tournament with strong backing too. They find themselves in the position of having to deal with high expectations, the hope being for a first-ever semi-final and maybe even more.
You’re coming off the back of back-to-back Six Nations championships, so you’re going to be a fancied team, of course,” said Best at Kingspan Stadium yesterday. “The way we’re looking at it is that people can talk however they want.
“We know what we need to get right to even be in that ballpark and that’s what we’re working on at the minute, making sure that we get stuff right and we’re doing things as professionally as we can and that we’re not cutting any corners.
“There’s a lot of talent around, but the big thing is that we don’t overestimate the talent in the Southern Hemisphere. There’s a fair bit of talent in the Northern Hemisphere as well.
“When you watch the last weekend of the Six Nations, if that had been produced down in the Rugby Championship people would be talking about it for years and years to come. For me, it was the greatest weekend – even though I was stuck in the middle of it. As a pure rugby spectacle, it was outstanding.”
Ireland’s preparation for facing the very best in the world moves up another notch in eight days’ time, when they take on Warren Gatland’s Wales in Cardiff on 8 August.
After the “necessary evil” that has been the last five weeks of heavy pre-season training, Best says he and his teammates are relieved to be nearing a return to game day.
“We feel we’re building well,” said Best. “It’s going to be a major step up on Saturday week from what we’re doing.
“There’s only so much you can replicate on the training pitch and in fitness games compared to what it’s going to be like in the Millennium Stadium under a closed roof. For boys hoping to go to the World Cup it’s going to be a great atmosphere.”
- This article was updated at 11.58 to alter the word ‘possible’ to ‘likely’ in the third paragraph to reflect the fact that Ireland could meet South Africa in the semi-finals.
A refreshing dose of confidence. In other years we would be talking about not underestimating Italy.
Any team is there for the taking. Gone are the days of Ireland turning up and having a few heroic defeats. At this stage, I wouldn’t even fear playing the All Blacks. They’re not bogeymen but just another team that can be beaten with hard work and belief. 50 days to go.
Indeed. Also, despite the eye appealing nature of this weekend’s games, the question remains can they do it in a wet and windy UK?
I live in the UK and autumn is usually a fairly mild time of year.
But I get your point and overall conditions should suit the Northern hemisphere teams.
I don’t think wet conditions favour anybody.
Definitely not the ball retention phase game that Schmidt has been developing with Ireland.
Not sure Ireland play a ball retention game at all. To me we appear to try attack from first few phases before making a contestable box kick, garryowen or long for touch.
We often quick from our own half as exit strategy.
And yes we do try to strike off set piece play.
However when we have the ball in the oppositions half we retain possession and go through phase after phase to try and find an opening.
Remember the epic phase play against Wales for example.
It might be different for the World Cup but a big part of our attack so far has been trying to wear teams out by holding onto the ball.
Yes in the Wales game we certainly did. 32 phases and then 13 phases later in game. However we got nothing from the first 32 phases and got 3 points from the second batch. It was an ineffective way of playing and we lost the match. We looked much better with various options that kept opponents guessing.
Varying the point of attack such as drop goals in the oppositions half and kicks behind the line defence are difficult to defend. Multi phase play without coming away with points is losing the energy battle.
Sickened at the thought of those warm up games and the chance of losing a key player. Remember David Wallace? Career ended against England in a warm up game. We have little to fear from Oz or SA, the kiwis still scare me though. At this point England and NZ seem to me to be the only teams I would be wary of. Either way our path to a trophy is through NZ. Interesting times ahead. Never been so excited for tournaments as since Joe and the boys started to show their stuff against the kiwis in Landsdowne. We haven’t looked back since. Great things could be coming. God I can’t wait.
We could meet Boks in semi final. very unlikely I know, but if we win group and they’re 2nd in theirs and then we both win quarters
Most open WC to date. 5 teams with a chance to shine and take the honours – Ire, Eng and then the 3 big S Hemisphere will always bring their A game.
Write off France at your peril
Obviously our only hope is to top the group
Argentina are no push over these days and should we defeat them our World Cup final would be the semis
After that it’s in the lap of the gods
New Zealand South Africa and Australia always show their bulk and prowess in world cups and I expect nothing different
It’ll be interesting to see who looses in the English Welsh oz group
Our hopeful semi opponents
But I do feel we have a chance as I say if we are lucky enough to top the group and manage to surpass arg
Whoever we meet in semis will have had monster recent games and it would be our final in ways with them possibly looking a step further
All could play into our hands
Come on lads let’s beat France and give ourselves a chance