Stephen Ferris pinpoints why we could see a lot of Irish players start against New Zealand

The British and Irish Lions are off to a shaky start.

Two games played, they have had an unconvincing win and a poor loss under their belts. No one is sure what the starting lineup will be when the first test match against New Zealand takes place on 24 June. To beat the All Blacks means that the Lions would need a near perfect game, stopping their offloads and Stephen Ferris emphasised the importance of this. “All these guys, they’re all world class players. So when it comes to being on the pitch and having a mindset you have to have a mindset where you’re coming up to make a tackle that the priority is to stop the ball and to stop the man also but to stop the ball so there is no offloading," he said speaking on the latest episode of The Hard Yards. “So when you are tackling somebody you’re targeting the ball and as soon as you hit them you’re looking for the ball, you’re getting an arm on the ball. You’re going for a rip or a wrench to get the ball away. "You've seen Sonny Bill Williams do that in the first minute to CJ Stander as soon as CJ Stander came in he just hit him with a shoulder, bang, ripped the ball out of his hands and it was a turnover straight away. “And that’s the mindset you got to have and someone like Rory Best is really good at that, very good at targeting the ball. “And I think the Irish guys are much better than the rest of the guys at targeting the ball.” Former Leinster and Ireland player Kevin McLaughlin agreed with Ferris and believes that is why Ireland players might stand a better chance to start the test series. “I think what  [Stephen Ferris] was saying there is important. That’s the kind of mentality and the way the Irish team defends could be very suitable for this tour as a team that goes out and puts pressure on the ball and hits high and tries to prevent them sort of offloads and choke the ball up. “The risk there is that you soak a lot of yards but if it is going to stop offloads, one of the main weapons of the All Blacks it’s worth implementing. And I think that’s going to stand in the Irish guys’ favour.” You can listen to the full podcast below, conversation begins at  11:00 https://soundcloud.com/thehardyardssportsjoe/episode-19-do-the-new-zealand-media-dislike-warren-gatland