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No Love Lost
By Tony Tighe
DESPITE performing woefully in France last autumn both Ireland and Wales
remain in Six Nations contention ahead of their Croke Park clash on Saturday
afternoon.
Ireland’s chance of a first Grand Slam since 1948 has passed for
yet another year but their Welsh counterparts are just two games away
from their second clean sweep in four years. Throw a potential Triple
Crown and two warring managers into the mix and you’ve the makings
of quite a contest.
Like Ireland, Wales’ World Cup adventure ended prematurely. Little
was expected of them in this year’s Six Nations apart from a duel
with the Scots and Azurri for the wooden spoon but under the tenureship
of ex-Ireland coach Warren Gatland they have excelled.
A fantastic opening day win over England showed their Championship credentials
and that Twickenham win has been followed with comfortable victories over
Scotland and Italy. They travel to Dublin full of confidence as they look
to wrap up the Triple Crown ahead of their penultimate game with France.
However a lot of the spotlight has been directed on the two coaches who
have shared an unfriendly rivalry since O’Sullivan was hired as
Gatland’s assistant by the IRFU in 1999.
Little did Gatland know that he was practically grooming his understudy
and after two years he was sacked, with O’Sullivan taking over.
“I didn’t have a problem with Eddie coming on board,”
Gatland admitted. “The number of people who said ‘don’t
touch him’ was huge but you have to back your own judgment. I did
that and sometimes in life you get burned.
“When my contract was up in 2001 and I was called into a meeting
with the IRFU chairman it was ‘Warren, thanks very much for what
you’ve done for Irish rugby. We are not renewing your contract’.
I was massively disappointed.”
Saturday gives Gatland the perfect opportunity to exact some revenge on
his successor. O’Sullivan entered this year’s Six Nations
under immense pressure after a catastrophic World Cup. After a sluggish
opening-day win over Italy and a poor first-half in Paris Ireland finally
began to show signs of shaking their World Cup hangover and returning
to their old ways. A convincing victory over Scotland has backed that
theory up but O’Sullivan is by no means out of the woods yet and
a home defeat could signal the end of his reign after the conclusion of
the Championship.
Whether Ireland will prevail again lies heavily on the shoulders of Ronan
O’Gara who is central to all Ireland’s attacking plays. Heaven
forbid should he be forced off the field at any stage Ireland’s
Triple Crown hopes will go up in smoke. Wales on the other hand have the
luxury of two top-class out-halves in Stephen Jones and James Hook.
The latter performed brilliantly against England but Jones made an impact
against the Scots. Who will start Saturday is open to debate.
Over the past few years this has been a game that Ireland has regularly
won. Wales’ victory over O’Sullivan’s men in their 2005
Grand Slam year was their first since 2000 and only their third since
1995. Ireland have won 12 of the last 15 and should the Croke Park crowd
regain their roar this Saturday it could prove unlucky 13 for the visitors.
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