Evening with Kyle, Gibson and O'Driscoll: John O'Sullivanplays the link role as three rugby greats, from diverse eras, enjoy a conversational kick-around. and find they have much in common
Three men. Two hours. One room. A trove of memories. Opinions are by their nature largely subjective but few would cavil with the assertion that Jack Kyle, Mike Gibson and Brian O'Driscoll vie for the honour of being Ireland's finest ever rugby player. Trying to separate them would sunder families.
Their influence on the sport transcends their exploits in a green jersey or the red of the Lions, which each graced with distinction. Big fish in a global pond with reputations earned by deed in New Zealand, Australia and South Africa, rugby's ultimate proving grounds.
Corralled in the College Suite at the Westin Hotel in Dublin on a Monday night, they chivvy memories from one another, offering insights into times past and present. The stories have an undertone of respect and empathy. There is frequent laughter. It is a vocal collage of rugby memorabilia that goes back a couple of centuries.
The journalist is merely a conduit in facilitating the meeting and the suspicion is that, left with just the whirr of the tape recorder, conversation would never have waned and might even have gone on through the night. There is no need to prompt. Their interest in each other is genuine and unaffected, the humour self-deprecating.
Despite the age gaps a common bond exists: a symmetry in traits and attitudes that are not necessarily expressed. As players, each was - and one still is - innovative, capable of sublime moments of individual skill yet devoid of the self-indulgence that might compromise team ethic. The purpose of the artistry is to enhance the collective.
They dedicated themselves to their craft, honing skills, self-driven and open-minded in the pursuit of excellence. They listened to their peers, absorbing information, refining it and deploying it. These similarities are easily discernible from the conversation.
Kyle, who celebrates his 81st birthday next Saturday, played 46 times for Ireland - then a world record - in an 11-year career, winning a Grand Slam (1948) and two Triple Crowns. Affectionately dubbed "The Ghost", a reference to his ability to drift through defences, he toured New Zealand, Australia and Ceylon with the 1951 Lions, playing in all six tests and prompting the New Zealand Rugby Almanac to describe him as "an excellent team man, faultless in his handling, able to send out lengthy and accurate passes, and adept at making play for his supports".
For those who never witnessed him play - and are denied all but the briefest footage of his exploits - perhaps the most striking insight into his talent came from the acclaimed British sports journalist Frank Keating in his book The Great Number Tens.
"Then, with a dip of his hip, an electric change of gear, he left the floundering cover as rooted as trees and glistened pitter-pat over the mud 35 yards, the sodden turf ringing as he scored almost apologetically under the posts."
Gibson too captivated a generation, winning 69 caps for Ireland, a landmark surpassed only recently by Malcolm O'Kelly, and going on five Lions tours as a player, a record that will probably never be eclipsed.
He toured with the 1971 Lions, arguably the best ever to leave these islands in terms of talent, individual and collective, and the only team to beat the All Blacks in a test series on their own turf.
It is all the more laudable that even in such august company Gibson was singled out as the best of the best; in a nation not given to eulogising visiting players, some New Zealanders would maintain there was none better. Ever.
The former voice of rugby union commentary for nearly half a century, the BBC's Bill McLaren, when asked to name the best player he ever saw replied succinctly: "Mike Gibson. He could do everything."
No recourse to the archive is required to catalogue O'Driscoll's impact on the world game. His eloquence on the pitch captivates far more than just an Irish audience. Captain, talisman, centre of excellence, he has a few chapters still to pen before he joins Kyle and Gibson in the pantheon of rugby greats.
A lighter moment during the night emphasises the rich tapestry of rugby lore that links the three men, despite a pronouced generation gap.
Kyle smiles: "What's fascinating is that I can remember guys in my time who were born in the late 1890s, including one born in 1885. I have often mentioned that when I meet guys like Brian (O'Driscoll).
"If someone had come to me when I started playing (for Ireland) in 1947 and said I would like you to meet this man who played for Ireland in 1885, I'd wonder at the age gap. It's about the same number of years in those terms between myself and Brian.
"You'd say, 'My god, 1885. That's so long ago.' It's interesting to think who was born in the late 1800s by way of comparison. We passed into and are now through another century."
Amateur and professional, rugby's chasm
Rugby's evolution is clearly defined in a discussion about playing days where Corinthian ideals and values have been superseded by the hard-nosed attitudes and demands of professional sport. The days of introducing oneself to team-mates on the Friday before an international followed by a casual run-around and devising a gameplan born of consensual desperation have been replaced by rigid structures. Nothing is left to chance, from diet, through training to self-analysis; every bit as important as screening the opposition. Natural curiosity demanded O'Driscoll outline the specifics of playing as a professional before Kyle and Gibson elaborated on the sport's previous incarnation.
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: The weeks vary, largely down to what time of the year it is. I have never experienced anything like the pre-season this year. It was Michael Cheika's second year and he came in with the mindset that we'll try and bring them to breaking point and, just as they're about to break, give them four or five days off and that'll bring them back. Then we will go at them again.
It wasn't particularly enjoyable but then seeing your bodily composition change as you start resembling an athlete again after your summer excesses gives you a kick. We were doing four or five weights sessions a week, a couple of skills sessions and then a fitness session later in the afternoon.
A lot of it was spaced out so you have to avail of going back to bed. You would be flattened even by the weight sessions and their intensity.
It's just about muscle mass. We had a 10-week pre-season. Four or five days off after five weeks and then had the same stint again. That was probably five or six weeks without a rugby ball. We didn't do skill work during that period.
MIKE GIBSON:Are you closely monitored?
O'DRISCOLL: It was a brilliant set-up. Everything was about heart-rates. You went in that morning and were immediately on the computer to see how fresh you were feeling: your mood, your upper body, lower body, everything.
Pre-season is the only time I take advantage of supplements. I don't take creatine or any of those, I just take an energy-replacement supplement.
Because you are training so hard it's just about getting another meal into you. After sessions I'd just get a shake into me quickly. You do some amount of sleeping. It was really, really tough, this pre-season, the hardest by a long shot I have ever had, but I felt wonderful after it. You're watching your diet. The change in physique of the boys from day one to day 30 is amazing.
JACK RYLE:Are they putting on weight?
O'DRISCOLL: It's good-quality muscle mass. In an Irish context we go into camp on Sunday night for the Welsh game. We'll train, do weight sessions in the afternoon and then have team meetings. Before dinner we'll do some video analysis; that's (for) the team. You go and do your own then. There's such a massive emphasis put on that, not only analysing opposition but analysing yourself. Counter-analysis. It centres on what teams are watching you do.
You want to see if you are right-handed carrying with the ball or are you favouring one foot to step off. This sort of thing. It's really minute detail.
GIBSON: The idea of team analysis, individual analysis and patterns on the opposition and your own is interesting. In our era, what you would do was go to the cinema and see Pathe News highlights. That would be the extent of video analysis that was available.
You might have been playing in the match but there was no replay of any sort. So it was all word of mouth. You watched other matches and tried to pick up things about how other players played. It's much more refined, detailed and concentrated (now). It would certainly create a better player (nowadays) or put a burden onto a player to improve his game.
O'DRISCOLL: The regimen also includes other testing. When going for breakfast you immediately weigh yourself and put it down on a chart. What they have started getting into now is hydration levels, so you have to take a urine sample some mornings and that is tested to see how dehydrated you have become during sleep. You may have to take a dioralyte if you're below a certain level.
It's all charted. It's like a name-and-shame of individuals. You know when you wake up and see it a certain colour. If it's not white you know you're going to be in trouble.
JOHN O'SULLIVAN: Any tampering?
O'DRISCOLL: There's been all sorts of question marks arising out of samples. (Laughter.)
KYLE: It shows your kidneys are working for a start. It's an amazing routine altogether. It's the way the modern game has progressed.
GIBSON: It's different.
O'DRISCOLL: I can see the progression from the time I came into the (professional) game in 1999. The level of professionalism; it's a completely different game now from what it was in 1999 even with regard to how we approach things and our attitude. The detail factor now is so much greater.
GIBSON: It's the way a top company would look after its personnel. In my view when we played we viewed rugby as an escape from business. We had responsibilities to get our qualifications, to develop a practice. That was the priority in your life. And then, incidentally, you had a certain talent to play a sport, rugby in our case.
You then made as much time as possible to train. There was no question of monitoring and diet control and whether you could go out for an evening meal or go to the cinema or have a late night. You were your own monitor. My attitude was really one of saying, "Don't compromise your talent in any way; don't do anything that is going to impair your performance."
KYLE:When I was playing in Dublin, and it would be the same in your time, Mike, you took the train down on a Friday morning, had lunch maybe at the Shelbourne and then a run-out for half an hour or three-quarters of an hour.
You'd say to your scrumhalf, "We better work out some system of passes for tomorrow," nothing too complicated. We might have only just met. If I was going to the left I'd tap my left thigh, going to the right I'd tap my right thigh.
You came back for a bit of a team talk. There was no coach, just the captain.
Guys would make suggestions, like we might try this or somebody might do that. Then you had your game (the international) and on the Sunday morning you had your breakfast and went home.
You found out whether you were on the next side or not by listening to Radio Athlone on Sunday night.
GIBSON: Obviously found out how well you played. (Laughter.)
KYLE:If you didn't listen then your parents would and tell you that you were on for the next international.
GIBSON:And that you'd better wash the socks.
KYLE:By Tuesday you got an invitation to say that you had been selected for the side. Nobody phoned you up to tell you that you were on the next side.
GIBSON: It's such a different world (now). You have no idea from the outside. I would love to be part of it. It's just committing yourself to rugby in the way that Jack committed himself to his surgery and I do to a solicitor's practice.
You are putting all those energies into it. You are getting wonderful advice from experts to improve the talents you have been given.
Camaraderie, perks and parsimony
The emphasis on rehabilitation after matches means players often see less of their opponents in a social environment, a far cry from days gone by. Meanwhile the largesse dispensed to the current Ireland squad far exceeds the "perks" of yore.
MIKE GIBSON: If we played in a match, played hard and lost and so on; meeting up after coming off the field. It is still a natural thing to do?
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: It is but I think it has definitely changed for the worse. It couldn't be that players are taking defeat worse because I'm sure they had the same feelings when you were playing. People are still as passionate about how they play. But I notice that maybe the element of camaraderie, to a point, isn't as strong as it was perceived to be before I was playing anyway.
Some French teams, you get that element; you beat them and they're gone, you barely get a handshake.
JACK KYLE:Do you meet for a meal afterwards?
O'DRISCOLL: We do. That is a good opportunity to socialise.
GIBSON: That's very important.
O'DRISCOLL:Yes it is. The only struggle sometimes is how tired you can be after a game. If it's been a really tough match you are nearly falling into your dinner. But it's definitely worth being given the opportunity to go out and socialise with these guys having just kicked each other to bits. It's important you're still able to go and have a beer together.
KYLE:One of the interesting things that I can remember from post-international dinners was what we received at the table. Before us there was a long packet, which contained a cigar and four cigarettes. The Irish Rugby Union (logo), the shamrock, was on it. This was a little gift. A lot of us didn't smoke so we gave them to those that did.
JOHN O'SULLIVAN:The IRFU weren't always so generous.
KYLE:Robin Thompson, Irish international and Lions captain, told me this story himself. He swapped his jersey with a French guy after the first international. In the pavilion Billy Jeffares was waiting (shouting): "Jersey, jersey."
"Thompson?"
"I swapped my jersey with a Frenchman."
To which Jeffares responded: "Go and get it back." (Laughter.)
"I can't really, I have already given it to him."
Jeffares said: "That jersey was for you or whoever will play in your position for the season. Go and get it back."
Thompson: "I'll write you a cheque for it."
Jeffares: "No. We need that jersey back."
Robin told me that he had to go to the French hotel, find out where this guy was, get to his room and beg for the jersey back ( O'DRISCOLL: Oh my God) and bring it back to Billy Jeffares. It was a very different world.
GIBSON:The system when we played developed from one jersey per season, when we started, to two. So if you swapped after the first match you'd have a new jersey for the second game, but somebody else may not have swapped and they would have a jersey that would have been washed once. The third match my jersey would have been washed once, somebody else maybe three times. So that's where the 40 shades of green comes from; a total mishmash.
Eventually towards the end of my career you got one jersey per match. This was a real luxury. Mind you, at the start you still had to bring your own towel and soap.
KYLE:We were ordered to dine off the table d'hôte menu and had to meet our own telephone expenses. Anything ordered to your room was at your own account.
Jim McCarthy (a member of the Grand Slam team) told me about the letter he received after claiming expenses from the IRFU for a return train journey to Cork.
The fare was four pounds 18 shillings and six pence. He put in for five pounds because he'd stopped to make a telephone call or something along the way. He got the letter from the secretary (of the IRFU) to say that the union did not look very favourably on those who overcharged for expenses.
Lions, sheep and haircuts
Recent Lions tours resemble a military operation in terms of personnel and logistics. The irony is that they play just a fraction of the number of games undertaken by previous tourists. There is also a marked separation in terms of splitting the Wednesday and Saturday test teams into distinctive groups, which would be anathema to previous tourists.
JACK KYLE: The only time that we got within 10 per cent of what these chaps are doing (now) was when we were on (a Lions) tour. We had two chaps who managed us, no coach or anything, in 1950. We usually played every Saturday and Wednesday. So if you weren't playing on the Wednesday you trained Monday and Tuesday. The guys who were playing on the Wednesday would only train Monday and that sort of thing. Saturday was the night off and Sunday you were taken to see a mountain or Rotorua or a school.
When we left London the colonial secretary spoke to us and said, "Now, chaps, you're representing your country here, you're representing your team, you're representing your school," and more or less to behave ourselves.
We were to show that we were good ambassadors for our country and team.
MIKE GIBSON: Never mind the results.
KYLE: In many ways it was like that. When you think about going out by ship (to New Zealand), which took a month.
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: What do you do for a month on a ship?
KYLE:The ship normally carried sheep. (Laughter.) New Zealand lamb was the great thing in those days. It was a ship which took some passengers and there were only 80 of us (passengers). There was one young girl of 15 who happened to be the only girl on the ship.
It used to get ridiculous. You all might have heard of the eating competitions where Tom Clifford would eat through every dish on the menu and (Bill) McKay was a runner-up, six courses behind.
GIBSON:All ideal preparation for the All Blacks.
KYLE:I remember dear old George Norton when he got onto the ship saying to us: "Now, lads, this is your chance. You know that if you get your hair all cut off, it'll grow much more luxuriantly during the voyage. You'll never have a chance like this. By the time you get to New Zealand, it'll be (thick and glossy)."
We said to George, "You go down and try it first." George came up with his hair virtually shaved off, cut down to about an eighth of an inch. We looked at George and said no, we definitely don't want to do that. By the time we got to New Zealand George's hair had grown about another eighth of an inch. All of us were pleased that we didn't follow his advice.
We were three months in New Zealand and a month in Australia (31 matches) and it took 31 days going home, with a game in Ceylon. It was the last (Lions) team to travel by ship. I think it was down to insurance. They were worried about insuring all the players for flying. We didn't fly anywhere in New Zealand or Australia. We even crossed the Tasman Sea, which took us four-and-a-half days, by ship. Boy, that was a rough journey.
We had one journalist with us, a lovely man, DR (Dai) Gent, who wrote for the Sunday Times. He had Welsh connections but realised he couldn't get on the Welsh side and played scrumhalf for England. He wasn't really a journalist. He just took the job up when he finished as headmaster at a school. He used to write his column and do a five-minute broadcast once a week.
A lovely little man. He used to read poetry to us, very taken with English literature. He found it very lonely, as we were away for over six months, got homesick and returned home after about five weeks of the tour.
GIBSON:On my Lions tours the media needed the trust of the players to exist in proximity to the touring party. And in the main they ignored them off the field, the social incidents and so on. They concentrated on the rugby. Some of the things that went on, on various tours I was on, if they happened now they'd be front of the newspaper without a shadow of a doubt.
KYLE:One thing that struck me is the physique of the players. I was telling you about a guy who has written this book on the 1950 Lions tour and included our weights and sizes. There were two guys, one 15 stone, four pounds, and the other 15 stone exactly, and those were the two heaviest guys out of the 31 players.
O'DRISCOLL: That's how heavy I am.
GIBSON: You (Brian in terms of weight) would have been close to Willie John (McBride). It's ludicrous. In 1966 there the matches weren't televised. By the time we (Lions) arrived in 71, they were broadcasting the second half of the first test match on the radio. It was almost emotional because you realised they were now going to go live back home and we were leading 6-3. I had been brought up to lose to New Zealand. You thought about your parents, wife, tuning in. Because we won the match they made a decision to give full radio broadcasting for the second and third tests.
Then they had television for the fourth test. It's divorced from the coverage that's available now, where they cover every match of the tour.
KYLE:Someone sent me a book on Lions tours and there was an account of Sammy Walker's 1938 Lions tour. In the last test match - they had lost the first two - they were losing 11-6 or something at half-time. The word went back home that the lads were losing. They turned the game around and won by 21-16.
The guy who got the news back in the BBC in England thought there must be something wrong because the South Africans were leading at the interval. He thought it must be South Africa 21 Lions 16 and he announced it over the radio. They had to correct it later. You know the interesting thing about that last test was that there were eight Irishmen playing. When will that ever happen again?
Weights, hills and skills
The development of potential internationals is a primary concern for Irish rugby but it is a balancing act where the lines between a sculpted physique and the skills required to thrive at the highest level can become blurred. There must also be a concern about assuring a future for players when their rugby careers are finished.
JACK KYLE: Brian, do the union (IRFU) encourage guys to look for a career after rugby?
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL:They do, particularly IRUPA. They are the ones in conjunction with the union who are trying to encourage players to look to the future. There are 120 players on professional contracts in Ireland; 22 get into a national team. There are a lot that aren't going to make big careers of it.
They are working on yearly or two-yearly contracts and not knowing whether they are going to be renewed. They have certainly improved in the last few years to encourage guys to study.
MIKE GIBSON: Do they give them advice on a one-to-one basis?
O'DRISCOLL:There are opportunities to get advice. It is up to the individual whether they want to avail of it.
KYLE:If you're lucky you're probably going to get to 32 or 33 (as a professional player). After that, one hopes, you have a long life, and you have to have something that will develop another side of you.
GIBSON:It's vital. You (Brian) would obviously be the leader. I don't know how many Irish players would say, "I can make a living out of rugby," and will have sufficient funds to have a reasonably comfortable life on the basis of my rugby earnings.
O'DRISCOLL: I still think pretty much that everyone can't, me included. It's not as if I could sit on my laurels at the end of it all.
GIBSON:Your achievement has been so great that people will be clamouring. There is no doubt about your position being assured. But the bit I am concerned about is when I go to a schools cup final at Ravenhill and in the programme you read of players and they talk of "career" and say "rugby player." These are boys who are 16.
O'DRISCOLL: I never grew up with that idea, and I was talking to Luke Fitzgerald about this the other day: about how these kids are coming out of school and that is their career choice. I never thought that was an option. I was like, "I'll go to college and see where that takes me."
It's a very rare player that comes out of school and jumps into a senior squad.
GIBSON:I would say that out of a decade of school cup finals at Ravenhill, you may get two internationals. That's what worries me, people who are committing themselves to rugby and maybe ignoring a bit of academic work. There must be many players playing provincial rugby and that's going to be their height.
O'DRISCOLL:A lot of players.
GIBSON:You'd actually get a taste for a reasonably good life if you were 20, 21 and earning €40,000. You may then develop an injury and you have nothing substantive to fall back on.
O'DRISCOLL: A coach that brought you in leaves, another one comes along and he doesn't think as highly of you. I see a bit of a worry down the line. There is a thing called the sub-academy, which involves players just out of schools - Luke is an exception because he went straight to a provincial contract - and these guys are not even being paid. You have never seen kids working as hard. I think in the long run it could be detrimental.
Besides the payment aspect, these kids are 18 years of age and they are faced with a monumental training regimen. There has to be some scope for 18-year-olds to enjoy themselves. I think that side of things has been left behind. That side of professionalism works against you.
If I was (subjected) to that I think my interest levels would be broken down.
On Christmas Eve the sub-academy were up in Killiney doing hill running at 8am. These guys are kids.
GIBSON:What are they trying to teach?
O'DRISCOLL: They are doing that because the fitness coach isn't able to do rugby with them. He stands at the top of the hill with a stopwatch. These young guys are in danger of becoming robotic. You want to see the weights they are lifting in the gym. They would put me to shame and I'm eight years a professional.
These kids are starting at 15 and 16 lifting and they have got away from the whole skill aspect of passing and other things. They are incredibly powerful and muscle-bound guys but that's only one aspect of playing the sport. It's about practising your skills, trying new things and being a rugby player.
We have some incredible weightlifters but I don't know how many rugby players we will have. That's another concern.
GIBSON: The notion I had in listening to you (Brian). You can build the body, give him a real beach body. That's the easy thing to do. The difficult thing to do is to give him skills or develop his skills. I have always argued, do the simple things, the basics, the catching and passing. So long as you can do that you can exist in any company.
O'DRISCOLL: I fully agree.
GIBSON:If you haven't got the skill to take a pass or give a pass under pressure then I don't think you can survive.
KYLE:I remember talking to Dickie Lloyd, a great outhalf from the 1910 to 1912 era. He gave me two pieces of advice: work on my speed and always practise running while carrying a ball. There's many a guy who'll run with two empty hands but that's no use on a rugby field. It (speed) is one of those things, Brian, that a three-quarter needs more than anything else.
O'DRISCOLL: Nothing compensates for speed.
GIBSON:The starting point is pace. If you have pace then you can make up for the odd flaw. An example was your pass to (Shane) Horgan in the South African game. That didn't come from lifting weights and concentrating on building a body.
O'DRISCOLL: I wouldn't have done that last season. Because we have David Knox in Leinster we practise those skills. I have given two of those (flipped behind the back) for try-scoring passes this season because I have practised it.
GIBSON:If I were the coach, my first reaction would be, "Absolutely brilliant, Brian, but next time I would like you to bring your left hand into it just to make sure of it." (Laughter). Then I saw you do it again and thought, "Hey, that's in your armoury."
What about the Denis Hickie flip-over, did that just happen?
O'DRISCOLL:No, it was planned. I had done it in tip rugby a couple of times. I said to Denis, "If we get it this side, we'll have a go and see what happens."
GIBSON:Brilliant, brilliant, it really was. Was it forward?
O'DRISCOLL: I think it was.
KYLE:What I think is fascinating too watching a game is how frequently guys can make an opening from a breakdown in play and not from a set-piece. You notice - how many times when a ball comes from a lineout does a guy break through? It's very, very seldom. Somebody throws a pass that hits the ground and someone collects it and he's through.
O'DRISCOLL: Do you know why that's more prevalent now? It's probably because defensive systems are so organised and that breaks their rhythm. You switch off for a millisecond because the immediate danger seems to have gone and that costs you.
Tackling much bigger things
The rights and wrongs of backs and forwards colliding through the ages.
JACK KYLE: The thing about the big guys today is that they are moving very fast. It's a power issue. It is no wonder that we are seeing the injuries that we are seeing.
We were talking about Jonny Wilkinson earlier and his courage in taking these big guys head on is amazing. Guys like Brian have a duty to protect themselves. The more you think about it the more likely you are to get injured. But I think there are times when you say, "I could tackle this guy but there is a forward around."
MIKE GIBSON:You can't think like that. Courage is very important in an international rugby player. If you ever have any doubts about your courage, then stop.
We (Ireland) would have had 10 people who would have been international class. And you'd have had five people who said, "Dear God, you have given me a chance to play for Ireland and I am going to take it and I am really going to play with passion." They would make up for a deficiency.
I always reckoned if you're short on courage, stop.
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: Your mentality just changes when you get onto the pitch.
GIBSON:Of course it does, and it becomes a sacrifice. If you have to fall on a ball or make a tackle you do it. If you think about it for a moment then you are in trouble. You (Brian) talked about coming down the outhalf channel earlier. You'd have needed an experience of playing with Barry (John).
He would basically say, "I am created for better things than defensive chores. I am going to lend something special to this game and therefore I need my energies there. I will show myself to the game in due course but not in a defensive capacity. Michael, if something comes down there . . ."
I was inside centre - and he was absolutely sincere because when the moment came he wasn't there. In one particular game Colin Meads thundered around a ruck and I threw myself at his feet. I think he fell over me but I was left with a lump on my forehead for the rest of the tour as a reminder. It used to make Barry John smile when he saw it.
At least I was forewarned. But then he turned it on. When you saw his tactical kicking . . . You said he was lucky as so many balls landed a yard short and ran into touch but when you saw it for three months . . .
O'DRISCOLL:Luck runs out after a while all right.
GIBSON: His tactical kicking was just pinpoint stuff. He destroyed fullbacks.
Given a licence to thrill
Ireland stand on the cusp of another Six Nations with the carrot of honours dangled before the team. For Kyle and Gibson though the pleasure of watching the current crop of players comes not just in their winning but in the way they play the game.
MIKE GIBSON:A thing that I rejoice in when I watch Irish back play now is the dominance you have recaptured. Eddie O'Sullivan has freed you to play the ball.
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: Eddie was trying to talk down our performances in November and had a load of footage about where we went wrong. It was so people wouldn't lose the run of themselves. He had a fair point because I don't think that we were playing as well as people were giving us credit for. I thought, though, that we played better than the video footage did show.
What it did demonstrate was that with quick ruck ball there is no plan. Just go. You know what that structure is for? It's for forwards. (Laughter.) It's so they know where they have to be. That's why you struggle sometimes and find yourself on your own because you weren't meant to be there. I'm 25 yards up the pitch though.
GIBSON:And looking for support.
O'DRISCOLL: The best place to attack from is from your 22 to the halfway line.
GIBSON:Yes.
O'DRISCOLL:The opposition have to cover kicks, they're playing a little bit softer and they're expecting you to go, so I think that's the best attacking option.
And rather than playing a conservative game, backs, certainly on the teams I play with, like to get the ball. In the 22, the closer you get to their line, the more of a rush defence the opposition adopts.
For Wales we will have four or five back-line plays and a couple of different options off them - max four or five. We will work them out early on in the week and have them hammered down by Thursday, know exactly what we're doing.
GIBSON:I'm intrigued by this invasion by way of video analysis, with the English team having a camera on each player. You can imagine what that would have done.
O'DRISCOLL: Shortened a few careers.
JACK KYLE: People's memories are basically kind. They remember often the good things you did but not the games when you had a mediocre match, which everyone forgets or kindly chooses not to remember.
GIBSON:The thing you (Brian) were saying earlier about where to attack. One of the great lessons I had was from Carwyn James in 1971. His policy was when you have the ball you are on the attack on the basis that the opposition have to deal with you. If you had an opportunity, even in your own 22, then don't think something will go wrong, don't think someone will drop a pass. He said you're too good, and it was wonderful for the ego and the confidence.
Does O'Sullivan take that line? Is he basically an encourager.
O'DRISCOLL: He is. He is probably more of the mindset of playing rugby in their half. At the same time he does give you scope, but you don't want to make a mistake.
GIBSON: The impression I have watching you and the Irish back line is there is a great freedom about it.
O'DRISCOLL:There is, there definitely is. As much as Eddie comes in and talks us through what he thinks the good plays would be, we essentially come up with the menu ourselves.
GIBSON:The more important thing is going beyond the menu. If you have the mindset, if you have the attitude . . . when I watch you play your attitude is one of challenge: we are going to make the opposition work, work very hard to contain us because we are going to hit you in so many areas.
O'DRISCOLL: You don't want to disappoint them. (Laughter.)
GIBSON:How does O'Sullivan react if you do the wrong thing? Does he say, "I told you to kick it"?
O'DRISCOLL:If it was the right thing to do and it breaks down he (Eddie) says, "That was the play to make."
GIBSON:That's great, that's exactly what I'm looking for.
O'DRISCOLL: It's a good decision, just bad execution. It doesn't mean we don't do it anymore.
GIBSON:I always think fear of the mistake is the most inhibiting thing for a back.
O'DRISCOLL:It's a sign of weakness too.
GIBSON:When you clear that out of the way and simply have a belief in your own game, whether it's inside your own 22, then just go for it. Please never lose the ability to see an opportunity. If a player has the anxiety - "I wonder if I will retain my place" - the answer is he'll put a kick into touch.
O'DRISCOLL: After a while I think you'd find yourself being replaced because you're not creating anything. You might buy yourself another few caps but in the long run . . .
GIBSON:For personal satisfaction and development . . . That's why I say I love watching you fellas play, the Irish back line. Everybody looks as if they want to challenge their opponents from any position.
KYLE:It must be the best Irish back line we've seen for many, many years.
GIBSON: I wouldn't even say for many years. I think that the Ireland performances are the best I have seen at any time . . . I think they were of outstanding quality.
KYLE:Brian, we are very willing to relinquish our Grand Slam monopoly.
O'DRISCOLL:Is that right? (Laughter.)
KYLE: We have dined on it for 58 years so would you do something about it?
O'DRISCOLL: We'll gladly take it, take the mantle off you if it is given to us. (Laughter.)
KYLE:If someone had done it after about 10 years we would have been worried as in, "We're not going to get our photographs in the paper any more."
GIBSON: I can't join in that conversation; we didn't get anywhere close to it.
KYLE:There was that time when those guys wouldn't travel (1971). You would have won it that year.
GIBSON:Ifs and buts and so on. You were saying about the Grand Slam. It's not putting a burden on you (Brian and the team) but we should have the belief that we can destroy anybody.
KYLE: The funny thing about all sport is the unknown factor that creeps in.
O'DRISCOLL:Totally.
KYLE:You can call it what you like: the bounce of the ball, your day, the gaps appear, you get the opportunities. Other days . . . You know, Mike, that any three-quarter can go out on a day and there's not a gap. You can't see anything to get through and you are having to kick the ball. Another day, there seem to be gaps opening up.
O'DRISCOLL: Very, very true.
GIBSON:I can't see a back line as good as the Irish back line, simply cannot. I don't care what you say about the bounce of a ball. I don't think it'll come down to the bounce of a ball. It (Ireland's Six Nations campaign) excites me enormously.
Media intrusion, quote, unquote
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: The media gig in London prior to the start of the Six Nations Championship is a very long day. I would be into double figures in terms of television interviews, with the repetition factor huge in terms of the questions. I dread it and I'm always shattered by the end.
Then you have the Sunday papers, daily papers, radio, magazines and the photo calls with the various captains. It's about holding the trophy with the French captain, the Welsh captain, the Italian captain and so on. I'm not one for wishing days away but I look forward to the Wednesday night when it is over and done with.
MIKE GIBSON:Do you have a mental exercise of trying for a little variation?
O'DRISCOLL: I do. I can't say the same thing 12 times because I am just not capable of doing it. I start boring myself. (Laughter.)
JACK KYLE: You don't mind when other people bore you but when you bore yourself you're in real trouble. (Laughter.) . . . We weren't allowed to give interviews, go on the radio, write books while we were playing. In many ways we were saved from what you're going through, Brian. We were protected. And in fact it would also have been perceived as arrogant if you were talking.
At school if you scored a try and someone came up and slapped you on the back or hugged you, your house master or sports master would have said, "We don't want any of that stuff around here."
GIBSON: You often see old pictures, chaps going over for tries and everyone turns away.
KYLE:You put the ball down and quietly go back. If someone had slapped you on the back, you'd say, "What are you doing?"
It's a different world altogether.
O'DRISCOLL: There are downsides to professionalism in that we are wanted people in the media eyes. We are in the public domain and we are on the front of newspapers as well as the back. They pry into your private life, want to know a bit more about you and not just the rugby side of things. That's a very difficult aspect to deal with. I still find that very hard.
I have had reporters, well usually photographers, outside my house, taking snaps of me coming out and trying to see who is coming out with me.
GIBSON:My goodness.
O'DRISCOLL:There's no point in fighting them. They report incorrectly so much of the time, about apparently what you have been at, what you're doing and who you are with. They have the last word essentially. You can't challenge them because there is always going to be a tomorrow.
I find myself coming back from late-night shopping - it's just easier with fewer people around - with about four or five items that I don't need.
That comes from picking up things on shelves just so that you can get a break from the requests. Most people are nice and polite but there are times when you just literally want to get in and out of a shop. Then there are always people who'll make smart comments, but I suppose it goes with the territory.
GIBSON:We had a fellow, George Ace, great name, one of the characters. He used to sell suits to the IRFU officials. George was a fella you could say anything to. I would say, "Just be careful," and he would produce an article about which there would be no controversy. Often I would read a quote in the middle of George's articles which I would have been quite proud to have said. He would have been nowhere near me but that is the sort of relationship you had. Jack didn't face what you have today; I didn't face it; there was no invasion.
The only person who might have been comparable would have been Barry John. He was the top man in our era. He was a good-looking guy, great standard of play. He actually retired in his 20s because he could not take the pressure of publicity. He said he could not go into the shop without people talking to him . . . wanting this and that.
He brought out a Barry John annual. It wasn't bad, articles by various people, and in one of them he had a piece about George Best. He (John) went up and stayed with George for a few days. He came back and said, "Do I think I have problems?" He said, "That fellow doesn't have a moment. He has people on 24-hour call outside his house."
KYLE:I remember listening to (the broadcaster) Alistair Cooke, the guy who had A Letter From America. He made the point that when he was reporting in the 40s and 50s he didn't feel that the personal life of the politicians was any concern of ours.
GIBSON: That's the French style. Now it's all personal stories. It's a badge of honour in France. A politician without a mistress just wouldn't get a vote.
World Cup, excess baggage
Only O'Driscoll of the trio has played in a World Cup, the inaugural staging in 1987 coming too late for Kyle and Gibson. They are curious about the demands it presents.
MIKE GIBSON:Is there more tension (in a World Cup) when it comes to knock-out stages?
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: Yeah. The Argentina match, because of what had happened in 1999, carried a greater resonance when we faced the Pumas again in Adelaide in 2003. It was a terrible rugby game because everyone was so nervous. You could tell. It was a real chess match and wasn't an enjoyable game. Basically it came down to just trying to scrape ahead of them. The potential consequence of defeat hung over the match, that fear of repeating the failure of four years earlier in Lens.
The two (World Cups) I have been involved in have been massively different.
For the first I had just broken into the team and we were staying in Finnstown House in Lucan while next time around we were staying an hour and a half up the road from Sydney in a seaside resort. When you put the two beside each other, they were vastly different.
I really, really loved the World Cup in 2003. I had a great time, enjoyed the rugby and loved Australia. I look back on it with really fond memories despite the fact that we were beaten extremely well in the quarter-final. I suppose it was a little bit of a slow burner for us, for me in particular.
I hadn't really played particularly well in the first couple of games . . . There were a few question marks about a bit of excess weight that I was allegedly carrying. It was nice to be able to silence a few critics with the last couple of performances.
We haven't had the luxury of resting too many players and that could be the case again this year, mainly because of the way the games fall. Anyway most players don't want to sit out any games in a tournament like this. They are special.
GIBSON:Speaking of special, there were two matches on the American channel ESPN the other night.The first involved France against against Wales in 1991 and it was Serge Blanco's last game.
O'DRISCOLL:He converted a try with the last kick of the game.
GIBSON:He also scored the first try when he kicked over someone's head and covered 70 yards, but it was the way France played. Their backs had depth to their alignment and when they had a three-on-two or four-on-three they were clinical. The Welshmen closed up, just as they got into position to make the tackle, the ball was moved on. Suddenly a fella was running clear. France won by 30-odd points. And then they went to Twickenham on a miserable day and produced that try.
O'DRISCOLL: That was a phenomenal try. Blanco fields a ball behind his own line and they tap it and run. (Didier) Camberabero cross-kicked and Phillipe Saint-André collected and raced over to score under the posts. I remember seeing it and they played it back to an Enigma soundtrack, the two married together. You would have watched it all day.
Playing on the edge of the laws
Much has been made of the current trend, largely pioneered by the Australians almost two decades ago, of passing behind decoy runners and to a certain extent blockers. It's a fine line, as O'Driscoll explains.
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: I saw it in New Zealand during the Lions tour and noticed how they got away with it. I have probably adopted a bit myself in tandem with Darce (Gordon D'Arcy). I run short from the 13 channel and the ball is moved behind my back to Darce going wide. There is an option of hitting me if my opponent steps off the tackle. If the ball does go behind my back the priority is to hamper the drifting opposing defence, not deliberately of course. What I do is try and continue running so that I run into his way. I mightn't charge into him and knock him over but I just continue with my run and pretend nonchalantly that nothing's going on here. They have to get you out of their way and that's the millisecond; it's all it takes.
The reason I started bringing it in was because people were getting away with it. I wouldn't be all for it myself because I think there is an element of taking players out. We have brought in this "behind player's back" rule in the last few years and that's fair enough, but you have to marshal it well. This particular play is not healthy for the game but . . . you have to keep up.
MIKE GIBSON:That was a set-play move. I was listening to David Humphreys speak about the structure of game-plans at one stage. He would know that when Ulster got a kick-off and won the ball, the call that he would make would govern the next three moves. Is that not too much control?
I could see someone like you, Brian, saying, "If I get really good ball, a ball for which the correct thing to do is to put a kick ahead or do something else which is not in the manual, I'll do it."
The best: for and against
JACK KYLE: The best I played against was Cliff Morgan. Team-mate? Bleddyn Williams was excellent on the 1950 Lions tour. Jeff Butterfield was a very good centre. It was very sad to hear about Cliff's laryngectomy. He had that wonderful voice that embellished any match commentary.
MIKE GIBSON:Sorry to change tack for a moment but do you (Brian) ever feel emotional in the course of a game?
BRIAN O'DRISCOLL: Not during a game.
GIBSON:How do you feel when you are standing up for The Soldier's Song. Does that not stir you?
O'DRISCOLL:Of course it does. You feel an element of emotion there depending on what's at stake in that particular game.
GIBSON:I remember that playing at Wales, you didn't need a team talk. You just had to listen to the Welsh national anthem and tears would come to your eyes.
KYLE:When we used to change in Cardiff the two pavilions were side by side and there was a very thin wooden partition between the teams. . . You'd be standing there tying your boots up and suddenly from the Welsh pavilion would come that wonderful hymn Bread of Heaven. You used to think, "This isn't really fair. We don't mind playing a team but calling on divine intervention is unfair."
GIBSON:I'd single out Barry John and Gareth Edwards as the best I played with and against.
KYLE:Was there ever a greater pair of halfbacks than those guys?
GIBSON:He (Edwards) had an immensely strong upper body if something of an unusual frame. He had long legs and this squat torso. When he was going along the conveyor belt it just seems as if they stuck this body on top of the legs. There was nothing he couldn't do. Sometimes he settled into the role of "I'm going to practise my kicking today"; sometimes it was infuriating, playing on a Lions team and Gareth's practising his kicking. Barry just had this wonderful belief that there was nothing he couldn't do on the field except, obviously, tackle.
O'DRISCOLL: The best I played against was Timmy Horan. He had everything. Maybe not an unbelievable kicking game but he didn't need to kick the ball. He was just the hardest person to play against. You thought you had him and he'd just hunt you down. So strong, beautiful hands, quick. With? Martin Johnson was a colossus.
I'd probably have to say Jonny Wilkinson. For a guy that wasn't particularly quick, his passing was just a dream. Incredible service. Everyone knows about his kicking and defence.
He's probably the best I have played with.
In nominating the best, Jack Kyle, Mike Gibson and Brian O'Driscoll could have saved time and simply looked in the mirror.
