Kidney feels fans are not being treated fairly

RUGBY:IRELAND COACH Declan Kidney adopted a holistic stance when discussing the inconvenience of the arrangements governing the re-fixed Six Nations Championship match against France from the perspective of the national squad and management but was unequivocal in voicing his disappointment in how the game – due to be played on Sunday, March 4th – would impact upon the Ireland supporters.

The elongated bartering process conducted in a Six Nations committee boardroom saw Irish wishes for a Saturday afternoon fixture voted down.

In effect the tournament’s governing body decreed that Ireland must endure a six-day turnaround between the new date in Paris and their subsequent home game against Scotland the following weekend.

Kidney admitted: “From our point of view, it’s our job to get on with it. From a supporters’ point of view, I’m disappointed. They’ve already forked out to go over on a Saturday night and with a 9pm kick-off, that was never going to be a day trip. For the supporters to have to do it at 4pm on a Sunday, I don’t know how they are going to manage it.

“We’ve been fortunate in the way they’ve supported us, not just the Irish team. It’s the same people who support the provincial sides too: 4pm on a Sunday, it’s really awkward. Can you afford to go for the whole weekend again? I doubt it, not in these times.

“And yet if you’re fortunate enough to have work on Monday morning, how do you get home on Sunday night. I would imagine that’s extremely difficult.

“It’s different for us as a team, our job is to get on with it and we’ll do that. We’ve moved on from it. I feel the supporters have been unfairly treated.”

The Irish coach is pragmatic, realising the futility of dwelling on a set of circumstances that no matter how unpalatable won’t alter. The veneer of equanimity was only briefly interrupted when it was suggested that at least the Irish team won’t have to attend a second post-match function in Paris.

They will fly home on the night of the re-fixed game.

Kidney pointed out: “I wouldn’t like to think that’s much of an olive branch. If it was on I’m not too sure we’d be hanging around for it anyway. We have a match six days later. There is a business of looking after players too.

“We went to a post-match function the other night; I’m sure that will cover us off for that one. We should stop now Karl (Richardson), they’re only getting me going. I have been good so far, I won’t break out.”

The words were accompanied by a smile but there was no doubting the sentiment expressed.

The decision to bring an extended national squad to Carton House yesterday for a one-day, two-session, training camp – they were originally scheduled to spend a couple of days in Belfast this week – was borne of expediting work that needed to be done while conscious of provincial requirements for this weekend’s RaboDirect Pro12 matches.

Kidney explained: “I knew if we had our normal week we would have just brought in our XV and we needed to have 30 at training today for the type of work that we needed to do to make up for the lack of the game last weekend.

“There are a lot of lads that the provinces need and there’s a part of us that needs them to play games too. The structure of what we needed to do today changed totally with the game being postponed the other night and we just felt that the right balance was going to be to do one good day.

“A few of the lads, the Munster lads, are on a flight leaving at 5.30 in the morning (today) for Treviso. Connacht are at home, Leinster are at home and Ulster are in Cardiff, so they will leave on Friday and they need a bit of a run out as well then tomorrow.

“So had we kept them overnight we would have only done two-pitch sessions anyway in that period of time but this way what we did was changed it around to do two in the one day.

“The first one was more of a tactical one and then we had a good blow out this afternoon.

“Guys need to play. Ronan (O’Gara) played in Heineken (Cup) in weeks five and six (of that tournament) and there wasn’t a match the following week.

“He got two minutes against Wales, he didn’t play last week. If he doesn’t play this week, he is going into the Italian game without a match in five weeks.

“While there is always the risk of bangs and knocks they are more likely when you’re not playing on a regular basis. It’s important to get lads out there. It’s also important to support the provinces. They give us huge support.

“The easy thing for me to do would be to wrap them up in cotton wool and not have Donnacha Ryan or Peter O’Mahony over in Treviso. But if we do that, we don’t have the players between us to manage it totally separately.

“There is part of me that thinks why not wrap them up but there is part of me that thinks they need to play.”

Jonathan Sexton and Seán Cronin sat out the session nursing knocks while Donnacha Ryan will wear a face guard at the weekend to try and protect his broken nose, sustained in the defeat to Wales.

The Ireland players will return to camp next Sunday night to prepare for the game against Italy.