Rugby

Johnny Sexton says Ireland will play whatever style it takes to beat All Blacks

Captain acknowledges that side will likely have to be more pragmatic than Japan game

Johnny Sexton tackles Kieran Read during the match against New Zealand at the 2019 Rugby World Cup. Photo: Billy Stickland/Inpho

Gerry Thornley's face
Gerry Thornley
Tue Nov 9 2021 - 16:07

To stick or twist? Dare Ireland endeavour to play with the same intent and offloading ambition against the All Blacks, the masters of broken play rugby and with Beauden Barrett, the intercept king, in their ranks? Or is there a need to rein it in a tad?

Of course, no two games are quite the same, so it’s a little more complex than that and. As ever, Johnny Sexton sought to put Ireland’s approach both last Saturday against Japan and this coming Saturday against New Zealand into some kind of balance and perspective.

“That’s just the way the game unfolded on Saturday. We’ve always had the licence 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.

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“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,” said the Irish captain. “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.”

Even so, if nothing else, Ireland can go into this game against the world’s number one ranked side with confidence enhanced after the manner of the 60-5 win over Japan.

“It was important for us to start on a good note. We put a lot of pressure on ourselves last week to not be sitting here today and saying ‘we only had a few training sessions to prepare.’ We made sure we prepared properly in the limited time that we had.

“Now that the coaches have been in place for a couple of years or 18 months, whatever it is, we’re starting to get used to the systems and we were able to hit the ground running.

“At the same time, we saw a few things in the game that the All Blacks might have seen and we need to brush up on a couple of things to make sure that we’re ready to go against the best team in the world on Saturday.”

There was plenty of free-flowing attacking rugby in Ireland’s play on Saturday. Photo: Charles McQuillan/Getty Images

Sexton has faced New Zealand 13 times previously with either Ireland or the Lions, and after being on the losing side on the first six occasions, he has been part of three wins and a draw along with three more defeats in the last seven outings.

He says it’s the intensity, namely the speed with which they play and the physicality, which makes New Zealand so difficult to beat, and highlighted the insider knowledge which this All Blacks coaching ticket has on Ireland as well.

“We know what’s coming because we’ve played against them so many times but there’s a few lads who haven’t played against them that we have to let them know what it’s like out there against them.

“Look, all the focus is on making sure we can get our best performance out there at the weekend. We know what quality they possess, we know their coaches quite well having been coached by Greg Feek and John Plumtree before,” said Sexton in reference to the former Irish scrum and forwards coaches who are now filling the same briefs under Ian Foster.

“We know the strengths that they bring so we’ve got to make sure we’re in the best place possible come Saturday.”

One of the most striking features of Ireland’s attack against Japan was their work rate off the ball and hence how the ball carrier, and principally Sexton, invariably seemed to have plenty of options.

“We have been working on it very hard over the last couple of years,” said Sexton.

“We have seen it before. I think back to the Italy game and to 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.

“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.”

With that, and partly as a result, there appeared to be a greater calmness in Ireland’s decision-making albeit, as Sexton highlighted, also because of the way Ireland’s launch plays helped to negate Japan’s line speed in defence.

“We always want to be calmer on the ball, with our communication off it. It’s marrying that with the work rate and making sure when you have the ball and you are going to the line and you are aggressive with it.

“We had planned to play against a very aggressive defence with Japan. They tried to be but some of our starter play stuff was good and we got them on the back foot.

“But we know with New Zealand it’s not going to be the same. We’ll have to grind it out a bit more.”