IRELAND v SOUTH AFRICA:LAST WEEK Keith Earls "fessed up" a little bit. Not uncommonly for a young player he admitted to harbouring a lack of confidence and that when he faced international players who he had grown up admiring he had difficulty in believing he was as good as they were. Outsiders saw Earls's breathless talent and questioned how much more ability did he think he needed to carry him anywhere he wanted to go.
“I’d kind of be thinking ‘Jesus I’m not good enough to be there’ because maybe I’d grown up watching him (opponent) and maybe he’s a legend of the game,” said the Irish winger. “Now I’m in there . . . I just struggled a small bit.”
As well as team psychologist, Gerry Murphy, Earls mentioned four players who he listened to. Three of the names came as no surprise. One did. They were Brian O’Driscoll, Paul O’Connell, Ronan O’Gara and his peer, Rob Kearney.
“It was good hearing it from Rob, who is my own age,” continued Earls.” They were just telling me, you know, to relax.”
Earls revealed as much about the Irish fullback as he did about himself. Kearney is one of those rare animals who appears to talk the way he thinks. He has a can-do attitude and occasionally comes across as a detached observer. It is this cool, self analysis and his certainty of what he needs to do to reach ambitions that indicates an old head on young shoulders.
Kearney’s confidence has worked favourably for Leinster and Ireland. On both teams he publicly canvassed to be moved from the wing to fullback, where he saw more central involvement in matches and greater potential for his own skill set. Like O’Driscoll, O’Connell or O’Gara, Kearney will back himself. Earls could see it.
“I suppose I have to be (confident),” says Kearney of his own faith. “It’s something that I try and work on. I build up in my own head a level of confidence because I find that I play my best rugby when I am and if I do doubt myself and people around me then that’s when things start to go wrong.
“Everybody has their own different techniques,” he adds, ignoring Earls’s flattering reference. “You try and relive some good games that you’ve played, the good aspects that you did that week in training; maybe you made some good tackles. You try and put all these things together and slowly but surely it will manifest in your head that you’ve trained really well this week and you are prepared for the task ahead.”
Confidence is not arrogance or insolence. It is not brashness or impudence. But chutzpah is part of it. There is a little impertinence too, just enough to spark the motor. But Kearney succeeds because although he is still evolving at international level, his rugby ability is backed up with a brave and selfless streak. Every high ball he fields and invites damage to his unprotected rib cage, each charge into the gain line he makes is without restraint. South Africa will expect to test those physical aspects of Ireland’s game, as France did with them.
“Certainly as players we don’t physically under estimate ourselves,” he says. “I don’t think over the last year we’ve been shown up at the break down and maybe against NZ last year and in the autumn internationals we were physically off the mark. But since then I don’t think we’ve been shy in wanting to bring that physical aspect to our game.
“This week is going to be as physical as it is ever going to be for us. If we don’t bring that physical aspect to our game we are going to be in for an awakening. Slow down their ball and quicken up our ball. It’s just a simple basic of rugby.”
Late hits in the French game were also on show with Springbok hooker Bismarck du Pleiss flooring Cedric Heymans with an ill-timed tackle.
“It’s not in your mind at all,” explains Kearney. “It is a physical game and you do get those late. Sometimes they can be dangerous. But a late hit and your team get a penalty and the opposition get a card. So you’re happy enough,” he adds nonplussed. What else would you expect?
