The debate continues, if not exactly rages, as to whether Ireland's style of play will be good enough to win a World Cup. This in turn begs another question, namely whether or not we should be bothered right now one way or the other.
As to the first question, most likely Ireland's style of play will actually not be good enough to win a World Cup. Historically, the odds are against the northern hemisphere to begin with, and Ireland especially. Six of the previous seven World Cups have been won by the southern hemisphere big three, with New Zealand, South Africa and Australia lifting the William Webb Ellis trophy twice apiece. Furthermore, unlike one-time winners England, two-time finalists France, semi-finalists Wales and Scotland, Ireland have never even reached the last four.
Yet the bookies odds don't suggest this is a fait accompli. The All Blacks are favourites once more, but then again they always are. Paddy Power, a little surprisingly, make England second favourites at 4/1 – as much down to them having home advantage as anything else.
Even if they miss out on the title again, England will assuredly be stronger come the World Cup. One ventures that Joe Launchbury and Courtney Lawes played their way back on to the World Cup starting XV in absentia last Sunday week. Whether a young outhalf with scarcely a year in the role is sufficiently experienced to guide them home is another matter. Jonny Wilkinson was in his third season at 10 for England in 2003, and as Stuart Barnes has highlighted, the question as to whether excluding Steffon Armitage maximised their chances of winning won't go away.
South Africa, ranked second in the world, are 5/1 shots for a third title, with Ireland, remarkably, 8/1 fourth favourites – which must be the lowest odds they’ve ever been before a World Cup, even allowing for Irish-tinted betting. Then come Australia at 10/1, with Wales and France at 20/1 and 22/1, and Argentina deemed 100/1 shots.
Matt Williams is surely not alone in deeming this Six Nations relatively boring as a sporting spectacle, and Ireland will need to play much more of a ball-in-hand game if they are to win the World Cup, especially if they are to overcome the All Blacks.
Question of belief
There’s also the question of belief. England won the World Cup in 2003 after a breakthrough Grand Slam earlier that year. They played way more rugby in beating Ireland 42-6 in the final winner-takes-all shootout than in the World Cup. Style rarely wins World Cups. A superior style didn’t prevent Australia and the All Blacks losing to England and France on one quarter-final weekend in the 2007 tournament, nor Australia losing to Ireland four years ago. At the same tournament, France came within a point of New Zealand in the final, being left to harbour an understandable grudge for ever more after referee Craig Joubert’s display.
Most of all though, this is the Six Nations. It is an entity in itself and Ireland are seeking what would only be the third Grand Slam in their entire history, for heaven's sake. The overdue triumph of 2009 was largely formed on pick-and-jam rugby, but who's complaining now? And ditto if this triumph (and there's long way to go yet) were to be founded on a supreme kick-chase game.
After all, with two peerless exponents of the kicking game at half-back, outside of which are five backs who have all played full-back (plus another two on the bench, just to be sure), this is playing to one’s strengths. Furthermore, were Ireland to go into a World Cup with back-to-back titles for the first time since 1949, it would give them a self-belief that would exceed any body of work they’ve taken into previous World Cups.
Successive wins
What’s more, they have recorded successive wins over both of their main pool rivals, Italy and France, as well as beating possible quarter-final and semi-final opponents in Argentina and England. With regard to the French especially, this is relevant, albeit more relevant from an Irish perspective. Until the past four years, Ireland had won one and lost 11 of the previous dozen meetings with the French, including defeats at the 2003 and 2007 World Cups. They were Ireland’s
bêtes noires
. Not any more. Instead, for the first time since the early 1970s, Ireland have gone unbeaten for four games against the French, who have never beaten Ireland under Philippe Saint-André’s watch.
Indeed, what happens with France over the next two weekends might be of more relevance to Ireland’s World Cup aspirations. In reaching three finals and three semi-finals, France have usually illuminated the tournament with the performance of the competition, be it the 1987 semi-final win over Australia, or the 1999 and 2007 quarter-final wins over the All Blacks. But even though they came within a point of the All Blacks at the last final in Auckland, in truth they reached that final on the basis of one relatively inspired half in the quarter-finals against England.
This could be the fourth Six Nations in a row in which France finish in the bottom half under Saint-André. There is an increasing French viewpoint that wants to see Les Bleus lose to Italy and be well beaten by England, so as to force the French Federation into bringing in Raphael Ibanez. While France will assuredly be better prepared in a World Cup window, it is thus probably in Ireland’s interest that the French perform credibly over the next two weekends. gthornley@irishtimes.com
