KEATLEY ANSWERS THE CALL
Fly-half stars for wobbly Ireland but is unlikely to retain his place
WELL THAT Joe Schmidt, you just couldn’t be up to him. He found a fiendish way to drain the expectation that was starting to bubble around Ireland: just get them playing rugby like this! The operatic drama was confined to Wales and the Millennium Stadium on Friday night. The nation that invented opera had to make do with the grit and grime of a kitchen sink drama instead. If Wales versus England was Wagnerian, Ireland against Italy was scraped off the weary cobbles of Weatherfield.
A team that was a callow shade of green when announced last Thursday was weakened to a significant degree when Seán O’Brien journeyed deeper into injury misery before kick-off, with Tommy O’Donnell joining Jared Payne, Robbie Henshaw, Ian Keatley, Jordi Murphy and Jack McGrath in starting his first Six Nations match.
Two years ago, Ireland’s disastrous effort in Rome ended with the casualty count of a slasher movie. The effect was less dramatic here but as Ireland tried to puff and ponder their way around a conventional Italian defence the absence of O’Brien as a destructive freighter was increasingly felt.
There was another change from the regular starting team that demanded close attention, and it had Keatley at its core.
When news began to break on Wednesday that he would be preferred to Ian Madigan as deputy for Johnny Sexton in this match, the reaction could not have been more uniform – and it was one of astonishment.
In the hierarchies of Irish rugby Keatley was frankly never seriously ranked. Sexton was the unquestioned fly-half, and Madigan had this season moved decisively past Paddy Jackson as deputy.
Keatley drifted further off the back, dutifully praised for good performances with Munster this season but until the middle of last week never dwelled on as a contender to start a major Test.
Schmidt explained Keatley’s selection as one of plain sense given his club relationship with Conor Murray, but the sense stubbornly clung that Madigan was suffering for his Wolfhounds woes. No coach would ever admit that a player was picked because of the non-performance of another, but the suddenness of Keatley’s selection begged that conclusion.
However, his Munster form deserved acknowledgement. Keatley has long been praised for his durability, as if his refusal to walk away from the game because he hadn’t won 60 caps and a European Cup defined him.
He has been as ambitious as any wannabe 10, accepting he needed to leave Leinster and progressing dur- ing some tough and dulling defeats at Connacht. Determination has marbled Keatley’s professional career and it ran like a seam through his first Six Nations cap as well.
He accounted for all of Ireland’s total of 12 points until Conor Murray squeezed in a try after 65 minutes. His record off the tee was five out of five, made up of four penalties and a conversion, but the deeper detail tells the real story.
HE WAS Ireland’s most reliable moving part in the match, but his consistency was achieved despite three loose kicks in the first half that could have unravelled his game. One of them was straight into the chest of Italian winger Leonardo Sarto; another was an attempted diagonal through-kick easily blocked off. They were frustrated plays that drew great roars of Italian encouragement down off the stands, noise of the kind that can work its way into a man’s head. Not Keatley: those wobbles all occurred inside the first quarter and his game thrived from there.
Murray, showing the disjointed form of someone who hadn’t played for a month, flung a loose pass Keatley’s way after 27 minutes that required the Ireland fly-half to check his run, go back and gather the loose ball and then jink around an onrushing Italian.
After he had done all that, he kicked beautifully to within seven metres of the Italian line. He also
survived unwitting sabotage by the public address announcer before booting over his second penalty. Keatley’s first strike had been preceded by hearty jeers, and halfway through his routine the second time around the announcer decided to demand respect for the kicker. The ball still wafted surely over the bar.
If anyone knows what it is to earn something the hard way, it is the Ireland out-half. Of course whether we can refer to Keatley as that this morning is questionable. With Sexton cleared to return against France next Saturday, an instant return is expected. This is unsurprising, given he is proven as one of the best players in the world.
SCHMIDT showed this week that he cleaves to no gospel when picking his side; form does not trump past service, which itself is no guarantee of a place. What he deems the best team gets chosen and on that criterion a return for Sexton is inevitable, even with his 12-week absence.
Keatley should stay in the 23-man squad, though, but after a collective performance like this one read- ing the runes is difficult. There were no career-best efforts in green shirts here, and Cian Healy, Marty Moore, Iain Henderson, Jamie Heaslip, O’Brien, Eoin Reddan, Sexton, Luke Fitzgerald and Dave Kearney might all entertain serious ambitions of lining up for the anthems in six days’ time.
That is less down to squad depth than the shakiness of Ireland’s effort for most of this dreadful contest.
Keatley did more than most to keep his place, but has the misfortune of contesting it this week with a Lions star.
No matter what his fate he will not shirk the challenge. A man of substance guided Ireland through its wobble.