Best: Overly focused on quarter-final woes
NEW ZEALAND 46 IRELAND 14
Rory Best admitted Ireland’s fixation with their World Cup quarter-final sticking point proved their undoing in yesterday’s record defeat to New Zealand.
Ireland leaked seven tries in Tokyo en route to their record World Cup defeat, with Aaron Smith crossing twice and Beauden Barrett, Codie Taylor, Matt Todd, George Bridge and Jordie Barrett all also scoring.
Ireland lost their seventh quarter-final in nine World Cups, with their wait for a maiden semifinal now set to last at least 36 years given the next tournament is not until 2023.
Veteran hooker Best’s Ireland career is now at an end after 124 caps, the 37-year-old Ulster stalwart now retired in the wake of that crushing All Blacks defeat.
Ireland have long since admitted experimenting in this year’s Six Nations in a bid to peak at the World Cup, but Best has now conceded that strategy backfired.
“There is a lot of pressure on them and I think we allowed them to get a good start which took a little bit of the pressure off,” said skipper Best.
“Everyone talks about the pressure that’s on the All Blacks before quarter-finals but when you haven’t won one and you feel you have a great coaching set-up and great group of players then maybe you put too much pressure on.
“Maybe we have been looking at this for too long and been so focused on it that we forgot to win some of the little battles along the way over the last 12 months.
“We wanted to set a bar that no Irish team has met before. We’ve done that numerous times over the six-and-a-half years with Joe Schmid, who is also bowing out.
“It was an onus on us to win a quarter-final because then it becomes a habit.
“We talked about it years ago. I remember Paul O’Connell saying when we beat France three times-in-a -row leading into the last World Cup that it then becomes a habit because you expect to beat France.
“With Joe, he helped take away a bit of the fear factor that the All Blacks held in the last three Tests.
“But when you do that they see you coming a lot more and when you get the best team in the world fully prepared and fully focused on you it becomes that little bit more difficult.
“And when you make a few errors, and you let them get their tails up, it becomes even more difficult.”
Ireland claimed a penalty try and a score for Robbie Henshaw but that proved scant consolation as the All Blacks ran riot at Tokyo Stadium to book a semi-final meeting with England.
Asked to sum up his feelings in defeat, Best said: “Tired, sore, upset. Right now you focus on just what’s gone and we’re incredibly disappointed.
“I’m really upset with the thought I’ll never pull on a green jersey again except to go and support.”