Why can’t Farrell follow Galthie model for a French revolution?
Les Bleus boss has trusted in youth and is reaping rewards
TWO home victories, two wildly contrasting narratives. In Paris on Sunday, Stade de France was buzzing on a seminal afternoon for French rugby.
There was feverish anticipation prior to kick-off, relentless exhortation as the game unfolded and unbridled euphoria after Fabien Galthie’s revolution swept away a highly-fancied England. Dublin the day before was a lot different.
Where Stade de France was heaving, Lansdowne Road was Ryvitacracker flat, with the now customary complaints afterwards of thousands of occasion-junkies spending more time sourcing their own refreshment than getting behind a home team that needed all the help it could get.
Ireland were expected to kick off the Andy Farrell era with a tryladen romp against the hapless Scots, instead they were lucky to hold on for a 19-12 win.
It felt like a day where if Scotland fell into a barrel of lollipops they would have come out sucking their thumbs and Farrell’s men were extremely fortunate the visitors were so deficient in turning pressure into points.
Ireland’s hesitant performance immediately threw Farrell’s philosophies under the microscope and, while management and players will feel the victorious end justified the means, the following day’s events in Paris made you question again whether an glaring opportunity is being missed.
Or, to put it another way, rather than Farrell’s ‘steady as she goes’, one-game-at-a-time approach, would Ireland be on a better path to progress if he was ‘doing a Galthie’?
FOURYEAR FOCUS
THE fact that winners South Africa and runners-up England both ripped up the script 18 months out has altered thinking on fouryear planning for World Cups. Throw in the consensus that Ireland were too focused on the World Cup last year and lost their grip on 2019 before flaming out in Japan and there is now a belief that short-term planning with incremental building is the way to go.
The counter argument is that the most successful nation in World Cup history, New Zealand, have always operated within a four-year agenda and it would have landed them three in a row had they not been brilliantly ambushed by England.
And that is before you get to Ireland’s peculiar World Cup situation where, regardless of what policy they have adopted in the run-up to World Cups previously, it has failed dismally.
It points to embracing the one approach yet to be tried — the blatant, four years out, World Cup targeting being pursued by Galthie and France before they host the tournament in 2023.
Ireland cannot do this, we are told, the Six Nations is too important to the IRFU and there is the added pressure of securing results with the purpose of gaining a favourable World Cup draw when seedings are decided this November.
But Ireland had a favourable draw last time (grouped with Japan and Scotland and how did that work out?) while a bolder approach to the Six Nations would energise the public, and hence the IRFU, to a far greater degree than we experienced last weekend.
FLINGING YOUTH AT IT
THE match-day squad facing Wales tomorrow has a wearingly familiar feel to it. Bar Rob Herring coming in for the now-retired Rory Best at hooker, the pack is identical to the one ripped asunder in the quarter-final by the All Blacks last October while the backline shows only two changes, Jordan Larmour for the 33-year-old Rob Kearney at 15 and Andrew Conway for Keith Earls (named as substitute) on the wing.
Trusting in the same players to make amends for 2019 is commendable in one sense but it is also serves to ignore how bad Ireland were last year, as well as supporting the theory that Farrell is sticking too closely to the template that failed the Joe Schmidt regime (of which he was a key member).
Meanwhile, Galthie has gone for broke in the other direction — picking a Six Nations squad that featured 19 uncapped players, 14 aged 23 or less, and only player aged over 30.
It has energised France, whose vigour and enterprise on Sunday created a stark comparison with Ireland the day before, and while the French can lean on back-toback World Under 20 Championship-winning sides, there is young talent in Ireland worthy of similar backing.
If Ireland were following the Galthie template, the veteran core of the side would be moved aside because they will not be relevant at France 2023 and the likes of Eric O’Sullivan, Ronan Kelleher, Max Deegan, Craig Casey, Ryan Baird, Jack O’Donoghue and Robert
Baloucoune would be thrust straight into the mix to see how they go.
LEADING LIGHT
IN many ways, Johnny Sexton produced a remarkable performance last weekend considering he had not played since mid-December. The out-half’s ability and inspirational qualities have never been in question and scoring all of
Ireland’s points while captaining the side to a tough opening victory was a good effort by any measure.
But Sexton is 34 and will not be at the next World Cup and the issue of who is going to replace him long-term is still unresolved. Ross Byrne is ideally placed to step up, as he has done consistently for Leinster, and there is a need to give him a run of games as the main man at No10 rather than have him hanging around the fringes with the threat of Joey Carbery’s return from injury hovering overhead.
Likewise with the captaincy, Ireland need to know who is going to lead the team into France 2023.
Galthie has placed his trust in young, athletic backrow Charles Ollivon to captain his team all the way to the next World Cup and, having gone in as something of an unknown, Ollivon was sensational against England.
It increasingly feels like Farrell missed a trick by not going with James Ryan as the figurehead of a new departure — giving Sexton the captaincy cemented the notion that there has been no new departure.
OPEN RANGE
BUTTRESSED by a notable improvement in defence thanks to the canny acquisition of Shaun Edwards, it was obvious Galthie has granted his young side a licence to cut loose and their exuberance was infectious.
Meanwhile in Dublin, we had the deflatingly familiar sight of Conor Murray unleashing a string of futile box kicks along with the customary coterie of static one-out runners.
Last year proved Ireland need to break away from the scripted, pressure game that worked in 2018 but has now been figured out. Still, there is no indication so far that Farrell will free the considerable attacking verve in his squad.
Ireland had enough to hold off the brittle Scots but lack of variation will hurt them against the better teams.
PRESSURE POINTS
IT was noticeable that, after only one game, Farrell was feeling the heat a little this week. The ‘Faz’ media love-in that had characterised the run-in to the Six Nations had dissipated on both sides of the fence in the face of criticism of Ireland’s less-than-convincing opening performance.
This was a largely self-created situation. If Farrell had done a Galthie and made a concerted attempt to break with the Schmidt-era, he would have bought himself breathing space but, by sticking closely to the Schmidt script in terms of selection and tactics, the new coach is exposed.
The only way to any way justify this conservative approach is to continue winning but last weekend did not provide convincing evidence that Ireland will be a superior force to the Welsh, English or French.
In 2008, Eddie O’Sullivan went into the Six Nations with largely the same players and policies that failed disastrously at the World Cup a few months before — after only managing wins over Scotland and Italy, O’Sullivan was gone.
Farrell was not in charge for Ireland’s latest World Cup flop but he was a central figure and, if Ireland have a similarly underwhelming Six Nations, he will come under massive pressure a few months into his tenure for not moving on and not producing the results to justify not moving on.
Perhaps that will be what it takes to belatedly come to the realisation that the Galthie way is the best way forward…