Dec 03,2024
Andy Farrell doesn't believe that his Ireland team struggle with the favourites tag despite another lacklustre performance to end their Autumn Nations Series.
Gus McCarthy’s late try earned Ireland a 22-19 win over Australia on Saturday but they had to overturn a 13-5 first-half deficit, making "enough errors to lose two matches", according to Farrell afterwards.
Ireland went into the last two games against New Zealand, at the World Cup last year and at the start of November, as favourites, but underperformed on both occasions.
Similarly, the team were 12-point favourites when facing England in the Six Nations, which ended in a 23-22 loss, scuppering their Grand Slam chances, and fancied by 14 ahead of last weekend’s game.
The hosts had more possession (58%) and territory (69%), but made 28 handling errors, were turned over 20 times, missed 18 tackles and threw two intercepts.
"No, no," was Farrell’s reply to a question about his charges struggling to deal with expectation.
"I honestly put pressure on ourselves in a certain way to see how we deal with it.
"The more we put ourselves under that type of pressure, the better we’re going to be.
"That’s not to say we’re not going to slip up with that type of pressure.
"In the first half we put it on ourselves this week because of the 150th [anniversary of the IRFU].
"I hype it up more than it should be, probably because I want to see how we deal with it and it doesn’t always work out well but there’s certainly a lot of learning in it."
Scrum-half Jamison Gibson-Park (above) was also asked about Ireland going into themselves in certain games.
"It's been a bit frustrating in patches," said the 32-year-old New Zealand native, who won his 38th cap.
"We've seen mistakes we haven't normally seen, so we have to link it back to our habits in training and with our provinces."
Josh van der Flier’s try was Ireland’s only score of the first half, while the lineout continued to struggle.
Captain Caelan Doris couldn’t put his finger on what exactly went wrong in that 40 minutes.
"Possession and territory was good. There were a number of mistakes, inaccuracies, some due to the pressure they put on us and they've obviously done their homework around some of our set plays.
"But some were definitely in our control and we need to be better."
Farrell gave his assessment of the international window, after which Ireland find themselves still ranked number two in the world.
"Three out of four in the autumn, we'd love to win all four but all the games have brought something different and we found a way in this one so we're delighted with that," added Farrell, who steps away to take charge of the Lions until after the summer.
"So, I suppose, that's all that matters to me, where we're going.
"The story of the autumn for us is we've four new debutants, we've four new members of staff who are settled in really well and we know where we're going.
"The future is bright for me because we have the right people on the bus so we're excited about that."
Defence coach Simon Easterby, part of the Ireland set-up since 2014, takes over from Farrell.
"It's certainly nothing to do with me why we just win trophies," said the Englishman when asked about defending their title in the springtime.
"We've always done it together and the coaching staff that we've got are second to done so that's not changing. I'd expect us to kick on.
"I've just had a good chat with the players there.
"We pride ourselves on being good first up and I know that the southern hemispheres teams are going to come in battle hardened and Test-match fit but when you're coming into a top game like that New Zealand game, we let ourselves down in that regard.
"The first game that Ireland's got in the Six Nations is England here so they've got to be better coming in."
Meanwhile, Farrell revealed that Ireland are open to bringing in additional coaching staff in his absence.
Former captain Johnny Sexton was involved in this window as a consultant, while ex-Springboks assistant Felix Jones, who is currently serving his notice with England after stepping down as defence coach in the summer, are possible candidates.
"There certainly is scope there if we need it, whether we need it or not that’s another story," said the 49-year-old.
"We tend to dovetail pretty well in all types of areas and people will take responsibility not just for their own area but helping his team-mates out as well.
"So that’s all obviously been talked about over a long period and we’re getting there with how we’re going to go about it."
Ireland next face England at home on 1 February, before two games on the road against Scotland and Wales.
France are in Dublin on 8 March, with the campaign finishing against Italy in Rome a week later.
