TIME FOR TALKING IS OVER
England’s bully boys need to be silenced
NOTHING is sacred in this modern age of smartphones and social media. Revelations of an ‘anti-English’ video shown to the Republic of Ireland soccer team on the eve of their clash with England at Wembley is the latest firestorm to ignite across the Twittersphere.
This is nothing new. Cast your mind back to March 2018 and Eddie Jones was in the news again after a video emerged of the England head coach referring to the ‘scummy Irish’ when recalling his side’s defeat in Dublin the previous season.
Their first loss in 17 games and back- t o - back Grand Slams derailed for good measure. That loss hurt. Context is always important with these things. Jones was speaking at a corporate gig in July 2017. It was a relaxed setting and it was said in jest. Still, Jones rightly apologised for the remark.
Joe Schmidt’s Ireland would cruise past England with a 24-15 victory, sealing a Grand Slam in the process, and would parade the Six Nations trophy around Twickenham. Talk is cheap as they say.
And Ireland were well used to it. It wasn’t the first time Jones had taken a swipe. Warren Gatland was always happy to wind up Schmidt in the pre-match media build-up.
And All Blacks assistant coach Ian Foster made a thinly-veiled dig at Bundee Aki in the days leading up that fateful clash in Dublin in the same year.
In 2018, Ireland took all the cheap shots and did their talking on the pitch. England, Wales and New Zealand were all swept away while Saracens were demolished by Leinster in a European Cup quarter-final.
They are still attracting plenty of criticism these days. It was said in the heat of the moment and, again, context is important but the recent ‘softies’ jibe from Rassie Erasmus will have put a few noses out of j oint around Carton House.
Jones was at again on Thursday with his ‘United Nations’ quip about the sizeable presence of project players in the Ireland starting line-up while putting pressure on Andrew Porter and Ireland’s rookie half-back pairing. Classic Eddie.
Again, none of this is very out of step. The difference now is Ireland are getting bullied on the pitch as well as off it.
The heady days of 2018 seem like a long time ago. There have been many low points since then and now, and England have been responsible for three of those grim defeats. Ever since they stormed the Aviva in February 2019, Ireland have not looked the same.
Tipped for a big year and a big World Cup campaign, Schmidt’s men were wiped out by the rampant visitors that night. Jones had his troops fired up and armed with the perfect game plan as Maro Itoje, Manu Tuilagi and the Vunipola brothers battered Ireland into submission.
A few weeks later, Schmidt would admit that the whole experience had left his side a bit ‘broken’ and what was left of that squad’s fragile confidence was obliterated by the same opposition again on a sweltering day in Twickenham. A 57-15 loss a few weeks out from their flight to Tokyo was far from ideal.
February’s 24-12 loss in the same venue wasn’t quite as traumatic but it was the latest grizzly chapter. Could you still call this a ri valry after that trilogy of thrashings?
Andy Farrell’s squad will arrive in London looking to reverse that trend. Despite a squad picked on form and packed to the brim with muscular operators, the visitors still look vulnerable in a number of areas. Jones began the mind games on Thursday by imploring Pascal Gauzere to keep an eye on Porter’s scrummaging. This was the same French referee who penalised Leinster at scrum-time on seven occasions during that loss to Saracens in Dublin a few months ago.
There is method to the England boss’s supposed madness at times. All eyes will be on those first few scrums this afternoon and how Porter and Co will cope with a England pack, who have warmed
up for this meeting with attentional encounters against Italy and Georgia.
It’s a big day for Ronan Kelleher, starting just his second Test at hooker. The likes of Itoje will look to put the 22-year-old off his game at every opportunity and will celebrate wildly at any dodgy lineout darts. Ireland need at least parity in these areas to have any chance today, but they will be facing settled units across the board.
Many teams — including the All Blacks — have struggled to deal with England’s backrow trio over the past 24 months. The twin threats of Tom Curry and Sam Underhill — essentially a pair of opensides — augment the running game of Billy Vunipola.
Farrell has foregone a scavenging openside to accommodate a heavyweight combination of CJ Stander, Peter O’Mahony and Caelan Doris. It remains to be seen if this experiment does the trick.
If there are any systems failures in those areas then the likes of Jamison Gibson-Park and Ross Byrne — the rookie half backs with just 11 caps between them
— will be in for a long afternoon on the back foot. Ditto, Bundee Aki, James Lowe, Hugo Keenan.
The familiar nightmare scenario is England winning the collisions and the set-piece battle and playing the game on their own terms, deploying their kicking game and getting their strike runners into play.
For all the positive talk coming out of the Ireland camp, you get the feeling that a bruising fourth instalment is just around the corner.