The Ulster men have been the only ones to get us on our feet consistently.
They may not have made it to the Champions Cup quarter-finals, but Les Kiss’s side have shown glimpses of greatness in attack – like Rory Scholes’ breakaway score in Oyannax, or the Darren Cave try in the return fixture, which was born out of a beautiful little switcheroo.
Well, here’s hoping you enjoyed those moments because there is very little chance we will see too many like them in the Six Nations.
In fact, we would go as far as to say this could be the most attritional Six Nations of the professional era, with the defending champions setting the tone.
Fans are unlikely to care about the manner of victory, but if Joe Schmidt is to pull off an unprecedented third Six Nations title on the spin, it is likely he will do so by playing some of the least adventurous rugby imaginable.
To an extent the head coach’s hand has been forced. It’s very hard to absorb losses to injury like Iain Henderson, Peter O’Mahony, Mike Ross, Cian Healy, Marty Moore and Tommy Bowe – not to mention the retirement of Paul O’Connell – and look to creating a new expansive gameplan in the truncated post-World Cup Test window.
Add in the loss of defence coach Kiss, the poor form of the provinces and some of their leading lights plus Ireland’s front-loaded fixture schedule, and it is hard to see Schmidt turning away from the conservatism that has served him so well to date at Test level.
Northern hemisphere rugby did not emerge from the World Cup in great shape. For the first time the Six Nations failed to provide a single semi-finalist and the Europeans were stilted, predictable and one-dimensional in comparison to their all-singing, all-dancing counterparts from the Rugby Championship.
Ireland are the reigning kings of Europe and it is obvious Schmidt – who oversaw the development of a devastatingly incisive attacking game at Leinster – has cut his cloth accordingly.
Schmidt’s side retained their title last year despite scoring just eight tries – half of which came in the bonkers denouement against Scotland that erased form the memory much of what went before. Only bottom side Scotland (6) scored fewer.
Ireland’s strength was in their defence, where they conceded a measly three tries. Wales had the second best defensive record – Warren Gatland’s men conceded eight tries.
So Schmidt is likely to be deaf to calls for more offloads, more running rugby, less kicking and less set-piece dependence. Why change a winning formula?
The Kiwi is the attacking brains of the Irish operation, but with Kiss now at Ulster and Andy Farrell on gardening leave, he is forced to share defensive duties with Simon Easterby.
The loss of your defensive coach and on-field leader in O’Connell can have only one effect on Schmidt’s approach and the Ireland coach is sure to implement a low-risk gameplan that will allow new personnel to acclimatise to top-level Test rugby.
It doesn’t help that Ireland welcome Warren Gatland’s Welsh bruisers to the Aviva on the opening weekend. This is followed by a trip to Paris and then our second away date in Twickenham – not a schedule to encourage a loosening of the reins. If Ireland are to win this Six Nation it will be the hard way, with no room for error in the first three fixtures.
Gatland is almost as much of a Six Nations fixture at this stage as ‘Ireland’s Call’ and nearly as popular, but the coaches of Ireland’s next two opponents are new to the Six Nations environment.
Guy Noves was the father of French flair, but his Toulouse had begun to lose their fizz in the last five years, while French teams of late have been more suited to the attritional rugby that dominates the Top 14 and that’s a trend that could take longer to change direction than Uini Atonio.
Then there is Eddie Jones. The arrival of England’s new (foreign!!!) coach has seen last year’s runners-up installed as favourites for the championship. Japan’s win over South Africa provided one of the greatest World Cup moments of all time.
It showed what the Australian can achieve, but all of his greatest triumphs have been built out of discipline, organisation and hard work.
Even his former team-mate Mark Ella believes Australian rugby “went backwards” during Jones’ time in charge of the Wallabies. The Chariot won’t be veering too far off course during his tenure.
So, the stage is set for one of the most stultifying Six Nations in history. That’s not to say it won’t be compelling and if the likes of Johnny Sexton, Rob Kearney and Conor Murray rediscover their best form it can even be a historic one for Ireland.
But, speaking to the Sunday papers last week, Schmidt did not sound like he was about to put on a show.
“You certainly make the effort to bring as many arms to the battle as you can… One of those is to play with width, to play some inventive stuff and at the same time to be really clinical in those bits of the game you know you’ve got to be really good at.“(But) When you’re coming out of your 22, you’ve just got to be really accurate there because if you do make a mistake, you give an opportunity to a really good team who can quickly turn that into points.”
