The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
Best blocks pressure in historic Irish win
Hooker leads hosts to first home win over New Zealand
Rory Best has admitted he had to “block out” criticism and pressure ahead of captaining Ireland to their first-ever win over New Zealand on home soil.
Best conjured a compelling return to form as Ireland stunned the back-toback world champions 16-9 at a raucous Aviva Stadium in Dublin on Saturday.
The 36-year-old hooker devised the strategy of the hosts taking one collective step towards the Haka, to prove the All Blacks could not bully them.
Best then hit back to form after Ireland’s patchy showing in the win over Argentina the previous week, in an authoritative reassertion of his Test captaincy credentials.
Asked to sum up his feelings at receiving a standing ovation when he was substituted late on, Best joked: “I thought that was actually for Tadhg Furlong who came off at the same time. He had an unbelievable day in the scrum!”
Getting serious, however, Best continued: “I just felt a little bit rusty in there last week at the lineout, and we were put under a lot of pressure by New Zealand in that area as well.
“So I just had to block a bit of that out, and go about doing what I do well for the team – that’s working hard, trying to hit a few things, clean a few rucks and be there whenever the team needed me.
“And if everyone does that and everyone puts their hand up, then generally you get a good team performance.”
Jacob Stockdale’s cunning try separated the teams in the end, with the move straight out of head coach Joe Schmidt’s one-off play-book.
Schmidt afterwards joked he steals all his best set moves, and while that is clearly not true, Stockdale’s score had more than a touch of similarity to a try Beauden Barrett ran in during New Zealand’s 37-20 win over Australia in Yokohama in October.
Asked how long he spends devising his set moves, Schmidt joked: “I mostly steal them from other people!
“But I’m always on the lookout, I always keep my eye out. It’s hard to get patents on moves.
“We felt we could go back down that short-side, sometimes they work and sometimes they don’t. But it’s always nice when they do put them together.”