ROMAN RUINS
Beware the Ides of March . . . It was a perfect storm, recalls prop Mike Ross as a Brian O’Driscoll yellow card, injuries to key backs which left Peter O’Mahony playing as a winger, and a host of missed tackles saw Ireland fall to their only Six Nations defeat to Italy in 2013
AS ONE of four players in today’s match-day squad who featured in Ireland’s only Six Nations defeat to Italy, it was no surprise that Dave Kilcoyne ran a proverbial mile when he was asked earlier this week to recall his memories of that nightmare afternoon in Rome. “Best leave that back in the past and don’t be focusing on it for this weekend anyway,” the Ireland prop insisted.
Indeed, many would agree the less said the better about what unfolded at the Stadio Olimpico in 2013, yet it still serves as a cautionary tale ahead of Ireland’s must-win return to Rome.
Declan Kidney lost his job soon after a dismal campaign in which Ireland managed to win just one win game, en route to a fifth-place finish.
Unless there is an improvement in the way the current Ireland team are playing, Andy Farrell could well end up facing a similarly awful record in this year’s Six Nations.
Kilcoyne, Keith Earls, Cian Healy and Iain Henderson may not be too keen to remind their team-mates of the disastrous events of eight years ago, but the scars have lingered for many of those involved.
Luke Fitzgerald remembers chatting to Ian Madigan and Seán Cronin as the replacements warmed up behind the goal. From early on, the feeling amongst the group was that the game was not going to end well.
For all that Ireland were missing some key men, the spine of the team still included some big names, as Mike Ross is quick to point out.
“We had plenty of leadership in the team,” says Ireland’s starting tighthead that day.
“You look at Rory Best, Seán O’Brien, Jamie Heaslip and obviously Brian O’Driscoll, but he got sin-binned.”
It was only O’Driscoll’s second yellow card of his career, but if ever there was a snapshot from the 22-15 defeat that summed up Ireland’s frustrations, it was the 29th-minute incident involving the legendary former centre.
As Italian flanker Simone Favaro lay on the wrong side of a ruck, O’Driscoll took matters into his own hands, as Ross recalls: “Drico didn’t often get yellow-carded in fairness. I remember he might have gently encouraged someone to move away from the ruck with his studs!”
It’s the kind of thing that has long been, erm, stamped out of the game, but at the time, it was deemed a yellow-card offence, before the citing commissioner took a much more serious view of the matter and slapped O’Driscoll with a three-week ban.
Unbelievable
“Drico is a guy that everyone remembers for the unbelievable tries, but whenever anyone asks me about him, yeah, there is that stuff, but he was an unbelievable competitor, a proper warrior,” Fitzgerald says.
“It was my favourite trait about playing alongside him. He was an absolute dog when it came to the physical side of the game, he never gave an inch.
“But that was a real uncharacteristic one because usually he was able to do it with a bit of a measure. He was always a measured guy, but he kinda lost the head. The yellow card didn’t help things at all.”
Fitzgerald was on the pitch for five
minutes when O’Driscoll was sent to the bin, but by the time he had returned, Fitzgerald had already hobbled off.
A shoulder injury to Earls saw Fitzgerald sprung from the bench in the 24th minute and, shortly after, Ireland were forced into a second back-line switch as Luke Marshall suffered a head injury and was replaced by Ian Madigan.
Suddenly the pair of substitutes had gone from observing the carnage that was unfolding in front of them to being thrust into the middle of it.
Fitzgerald lasted all of 12 minutes before he tore his ACL, which prompted Kidney to replace the back with Iain Henderson, who took Peter O’Mahony’s place in the back-row, as the Munster man found himself on the wing.
“It was a stinker,” Fitzgerald reflects. “I remember before the game started I was talking to Ian Madigan. It was rock-hard pitch out there and I asked him, ‘Will I wear studs or blades?’ I stupidly listened to him and he said to wear studs. So, I wore studs on the baked surface. Anyway, I got on the pitch and it was absolute chaos.
“A guy made a half break and my foot got caught in the ground and I did my ACL, but I played on.
“I did a few of the tests and we were obviously down to our last back, so I played on for another 10 minutes with a torn ACL. It was a bit of a killer.”
With so much discussion surrounding
Ireland’s current out-half position, it’s worth casting your mind back to 2013 when the same kind of debate was raging.
Kidney decided that Ronan O’Gara’s days in the No 10 shirt were at an end, and with Johnny Sexton out injured, it was left to Paddy Jackson to pull the strings for the defeats to Scotland and Italy, as well as the draw with France.
O’Gara’s final appearance for Ireland would prove to be off the bench in the Scotland loss, as the succession plan was in full flow with Jackson and Madigan selected ahead of the veteran.
Eight years on, neither out-half is in the squad for very different reasons.
Italy sensed blood amid the inexperience and they pounced as Ireland
wilted under the Roman sun.
“Fubar, I think that was my overriding memory of it,” Ross laughs.
“It was one of those perfect storms. I had them a couple of times in rugby when everything that can go wrong, does go wrong. The Italians were fired up. It was spring time in Rome and it was (Andrea) Lo Cicero’s last game for them.
“I had butted heads with him plenty of times before. I remember at the 2011 World Cup when we were playing Italy, we had a scrum down in our own 22 and Tommy Bowe made a break up the wing.
“I was lucky the camera panned away because we had a fight after the scrum broke up! If the camera had stayed on it, there could have been a few citings!”
Leading 9-6 at the break, Italy pushed on to claim an historic victory, but the warning signs had been there long before that.
“I remember watching the first half with Seán Cronin and Ian Madigan,” Fitzgerald says. “We were under the posts at the other end of the pitch warming up and the defence that day... Jesus! There were people missing tackles all over the place.
“We were player-camming a few guys who I’m not going to mention, but it was just bizarre. They were missing tackles everywhere.
“It was like they weren’t playing for Ireland. In international matches people are flying at absolutely everything.
“Any time you get an opportunity to put a shot on someone, you’re doing it for Ireland and you can really feel the intensity of the tackles.
“People generally make mistakes at international level but it’s never really from a lack of hunger or desire. It’s never a physical thing.”
A second-half try from winger Giovanbattista Venditti was the killer blow and although Sergio Parisse was yellow-carded soon after, so too were Donnacha Ryan and Conor Murray late on, as Ireland’s misery was completed.
“Maybe there was complacency, yeah,” Fitzgerald admits. “I think the team had probably run its course in terms of the coach. I think there was a bit of, ‘Okay let’s move onto the next thing now.’
“Obviously that result copperfastened that. I felt it was coming to the end and people probably had enough of the weirdness.
“There were weird team talks and weird ways of selecting teams and dropping people. I think people probably felt it was time to move on in that respect.
“Maybe there was a bit of tiredness from all that kind of stuff. I felt like the
coaches weren’t really able to galvanise everyone and I think we saw that defensively that day.
“The amount of tackles we missed in the first half from some of our big players too. It was amazing to watch.
“We just felt there was something up. There was something off and there was a feeling that it wasn’t going to be our day. Obviously it was compounded by the yellow card for Drico. It was a really weird day at the office.”
Kidney was ousted as head coach afterwards, as he paid the ultimate price for a wretched campaign, before Joe Schmidt eventually took over.
“No one wanted it on their CV – the first Irish team to lose to Italy in the Six Nations, but unfortunately we got it that day,” Ross adds.
“When you get three yellow cards and lose a bunch of backs, Italy are going to take that opportunity, aren’t they? Italy weren’t a bad team then and they’re not a bad team now.”
The challenge for Ireland now, is not to fall into the same trap as their counterparts in 2013, as Fitzgerald warns.
“This squad is probably feeling a bit of pressure at the moment, and as much as you are kinda impervious to it and focusing on the game, you’re still human. You can still feel when the tide is maybe turning against you.”
March 16, 2013 was a dark day for Irish rugby and although the team that will take to the Stadio Olimpico pitch this afternoon are not nearly as depleted, the pressure is nevertheless on to deliver a result, as well as a performance.