Courtesy of the IRFU, here is Les Kiss, Ireland’s defence coach, telling us about this weeks camp in Limerick and more.
On how the first week of Ireland camp has gone
“It’s been fantastic so far. We’ve all been waiting to get together in preparation for a fairly tough schedule in the Guinness series and the Springboks game first up has really been our focus. The guys, you know I have to compliment them. They’ve come here and embraced the new ideas that the coaching staff have put on the table, they’ve added their own bits to the mix and we’re grateful that they’ve put in such a good performance for the week”.
On the Challenge of the Guinness Series
“They’re four really physical teams the Boks, Samoa, New Zealand and the Argentinean team. It’s a physical challenge right throughout the Guinness Series. That starts in defence in a lot of ways with the Springboks in particular, as they challenge you at the set piece, they challenge you around the edge of the rucks and they also have the ability to shift the ball around the park and hurt you in that way as well. Plus will they play a contestable kick game and challenge you in that way? So we have a lot on our plate to handle in that area, but the approach so far has been fantastic as I said earlier and we are just really looking forward to that first game and obviously it being the Aviva’s first game, we hope we can do it justice.”
On the tackle interpretations following the summer tests heading into the Guinness Series
“We had a plan going into the summer tests just to work out how that would work on our defence approach. There were certainly things that we took out of it (summer tour) that were beneficial. The provinces to date have had all their own little flavours on it and have bought into some of the ideas on how to look at the breakdown and how to handle the tackle area in terms of defence.”
“There is always going to be an opinion about where the interpretation should be going and what the referee should be doing. Each referee will have a slightly different interpretation on the day and like all teams we will adjust to that. I just think that the game has moved to a position now that we should still allow the referee to make his calls as he sees it. You are going to get good calls and bad calls on any given day and that is just part of the game and always has been. I don’t predict that the game is going to get very negative again as I think there is enough in the new interpretations to keep it an open affair but also makes it possible to have a tighter game. I think you want that sort of breadth of opportunity in the game to show different skill sets in an open and tight match.”
On Brian O’Driscoll
“Brian is working very hard and over the last two or three days he has put in some good rehab work with the medical staff who are doing a fantastic job there. Talking to him today after the session he was very happy where he ended up, so he has another (rehab) session tomorrow and a couple of days rest where he will obviously be doing a little bit of stuff and we will see how he goes after that.”
Keith Earls sat out training today as he continues the rehabilitation programme on his ankle injury. The Ireland team will train tomorrow in Limerick before they disperse for the weekend. The squad will assemble again in Dublin on Monday.
