IRELAND CAPTAIN JOHNNY Sexton says his team would love to attack as they did against Japan last weekend in every game, but must tailor their approach to suit the opposition and opportunities presented on the pitch.
Ireland made 14 linebreaks and offloaded the ball 20 times in their 60-5 hammering of the Japanese last Saturday in Dublin and many supporters are hoping to see more of the same against New Zealand this weekend.
While Sexton was keen to point out that Ireland have been working towards the fluidity and level of interplay within their 1-3-2-2 attack shape that we saw versus Japan, he underlined that not every game will bring similar chances.
“That’s just the way the game unfolded on Saturday,” said Sexton. “We’ve always had the license to do that but if teams show a different picture, you can’t do that all the time.
“We’d love to do it all the time. We just got presented with the pictures and we read them quite well and executed off the back of it. But if a team comes and puts 14 guys in the frontline, you can’t run and you’ve got to kick more. You’ve got to target different space.
“In an ideal world, yes, but if it’s raining or conditions are really bad and they play a different type of defence to what Japan showed us, well then we will play the right options that we see fit.
“The most important thing is that we win and that’s what we’re judged on. It’s great getting some plaudits for the way we played on Saturday, we showed bits of that during the Six Nations, but the pleasing part about it was that it was more consistent this week.
“But, again, I think Japan even said themselves that they weren’t too happy with what they put up on the day, so we’re playing against much better opposition this week I think.”
As things stand, the weather forecast for Saturday in Dublin does not indicate rain so there will be high hopes of a classic between Ireland and New Zealand.
While the opportunities to make linebreaks certainly won’t be as frequent as against Japan, Ireland’s attack will once again try to ensure Sexton has multiple options every time he’s on the ball.
“We have been working on it very hard over the last couple of years,” said the out-half. “We have seen it before. I think back to the Italy game and the Wales game last year when we had 14 which is a bit more difficult. We did some good things against Italy and against Scotland so it has been more evident in this calendar year.
“We were still getting used to it before that but there is still a little bit to go with it yet. We’re not saying we know it all but the boys did work hard off the ball and we created an awful lot of opportunities and as a 10, you are only as good as the guys around you.
“They have to make sure that you have those opportunities. They did it really well last Saturday but we have to up it again this week.”
Farrell said last Saturday that he doesn’t want an Ireland attack that is “too tidy” and Sexton is on the same page.
“I know what he means because we speak about it a lot. He wants those wingers getting involved off their wing. He doesn’t want them to stick to positions.
“He wants us to be unpredictable because that’s the hardest thing to defend against, a team you don’t know what they are going to do so the wingers [James Lowe and Andrew Conway] did that really well last week, with Hugo [Keenan], their work-rate was excellent. They are the guys that created a lot of opportunities, creating those extra men at times.”
The All Blacks’ reputation in rugby revolves around their clinical attacking skills but they have made a concerted effort in recent years to bring their defence up to the same level.
Sexton says their defensive approach has changed but other strengths remain exactly the same.
“They used to be a very soft… not soft, but with linespeed on the edges, they wouldn’t come up on the edges but they’ve changed fully now from what we’ve seen. They are very aggressive from the outside in.
“They try and put you under pressure so it’s something different to play against compared to what they’ve done in the past.
“But there are a lot of similarities with how good they are off turnover and breakdown and the individual threats they have.”
