IT TURNS OUT Josh van der Flier has a little bit of the French language.
His wife, Sophie, speaks it fluently on account of her dad being Belgian, so Josh has started trying to learn.
It’s suggested to him that it could come in handy if he signs for Racing 92 in the future and van der Flier laughs politely.
But really it would be no surprise if a club like Racing went after a player like van der Flier down the line. Ex-Leinster coach Stuart Lancaster is now head coach of the Parisians, who are in the business of attracting some of the best players in the game.
Springboks captain Siya Kolisi will join Racing after this World Cup and while van der Flier hasn’t lifted the Webb Ellis Cup, he’s certainly in the world-class bracket. Indeed, he remains the reigning World Rugby player of the year.
“It feels like a long time ago now,” says van der Flier of that honour.
Sitting in a room alongside the palatial Hôtel de Ville de Tours, the town hall, it’s striking how winning the highest individual honour in the game hasn’t changed van der Flier much, on an obvious surface level anyway. He’s still perhaps the friendliest and most mannerly person in Irish rugby.
He does say it has given him a little extra self-belief.
“I suppose if anything it gives you a bit of confidence, for me anyway, that I can play well at this level,” he says. “That’s all I get from it now at this stage.”
The slagging that award brought from his team-mates has died down now. For a while, van der Flier would take a good-natured slating for any tiny misstep he made. ‘World player of the year?!’ But it’s “long forgotten about now.”
One thing that hasn’t faded is the additional attention van der Flier gets from the opposition. It makes sense. There’s no way someone of his stature can fly under the radar now. The opposition all know who he is and what he can do.
“I wouldn’t say targeted but I’d be trying to run a little sneaky line somewhere in attack and I could hear someone calling my name and to keep an eye out for me in what I’m doing, there is definitely a bit of that,” says van der Flier.
“It was something I’m probably aware of when you first break onto the scene or whatever when I first started playing, you can get away with doing the things that you’re good at but after a while players, other opposition, you become known for things.
“Whenever we played David Pocock, all you are thinking is you’ve got to be really good at the breakdown because he will go for poaches. I’ve certainly noticed there have been times I haven’t got as many opportunities.
“Or any time I’ve felt I had a good chance at a ball carry, there are probably two people on me, that kind of thing. I suppose it opens up other opportunities for others but it’s something I’ve noticed over the last year or so.”
Having the world player of the year in their ranks is clearly a huge plus for Ireland simply because van der Flier is such a consistently excellent force.
And it helps that others around him remain contenders for any hypothetical World XVs, number eight Caelan Doris among them.
Van der Flier’s excitement to get stuck into his second World Cup this weekend positively beams out of him. He’s set to feature in a strong Ireland team against Romania in Bordeaux and he will be key as they look to go deep into the tournament.
He will have loads of loved ones coming over to watch the games – Sophie, his parents, siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, anyone and everyone who can make it.
He’s ready to get going now.
“I can still remember as a kid, the World Cup finishes and you can’t wait for four years until the next one starts,” says van der Flier, “that kind of excitement for any big sporting event like that.
“It’s probably the pinnacle of rugby in terms of international rugby obviously. The World Cup is probably always up there as the highest honour of a tournament to be part of.
“It’s always huge, there’s always huge excitement about it as a kid, and then to get to play in the last one was incredibly special.
“It was a pretty cool experience. It was obviously very different to being here now. It’s obviously closer to home here, whereas the time difference and everything was so far away in Japan.
“It’s a brilliant tournament. There is always so much excitement. You can kind of see when you bump into people on the street, even around here in Tours and back home. There is just great excitement around it, which you probably don’t get for any other tournament really.”
