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If you know anything of Joe Schmidt, then he’ll have popped into your head every other time referee Chris Busby penalised the Wallabies at Murrayfield last Sunday. You could imagine the coach formulating the email that would wing its way to World Rugby – coincidentally where Schmidt spent 12 months of his career a few years back. The attachments would have included all available camera angles, along with the relevant points of law. Chances are every case made would have been compelling.
Would he have had a good night’s sleep in the south Dublin hotel where his squad checked in after travelling from Edinburgh? You could answer that with the word he would use with Leinster players when they’d suggest a move he didn’t think would work: “Nah.”
So much stuff churning around in his head, so much to be done ahead of the Ireland Test. Schmidt can only hope that Saturday’s referee, Andrea Piardi, sees the world a different way from Busby. Regardless, there was homework to be done. Top of that list is how to cope if Ireland are as effective as Scotland in dealing with Australia’s power game.
Post-match in Murrayfield a Scottish colleague said: “At last, Scotland look as good as Gregor [Townsend] has been saying for the last five years!” Why? Because they were on the gain line before the Wallabies arrived and were not for moving. Well, not backwards. Schmidt is chasing regular 80-minute performances as a goal, which was scored in that Test by the Scots.
So he’ll have to do a workaround if Ireland bring the same tools to their trade. In the middle of this preparation, however, he got an answer to a critical question: who will Andy Farrell select at No 10?
The current Ireland coach cut his teeth in this job by relying on the senior players to carry the load. In opting for Sam Prendergast over Jack Crowley, however, he has changed gear and accelerated off script. True, in his third season of Test rugby, Crowley is hardly veteran status, but in the wake of Johnny Sexton it will take a while for anyone to get that badge. Crowley has filled the gap as well as could have been hoped. Then Prendergast appears off the bench against the Pumas a fortnight ago, follows it up with a composed canter around Lansdowne Road against Fiji, and, bingo, he’s starting against the Wallabies?
You could almost hear the wheels spinning in Schmidt’s head. By the time they stopped surely he had reduced to a usable number the options for making life very difficult for the new man. Prendergast was a couple of years short of graduating from secondary school when Schmidt was suffering his second World Cup calamity with Ireland, in Japan 2019. Now they are in the same theatre: one centre stage, looking to remember his lines and continue his smooth delivery; the other heckling by proxy from the audience.
“I thought he did really well against Fiji, and Faz must have thought he went all right as well, I suppose, because he’s put him back in against us,” Schmidt says. “And that’s real confidence. I’m not saying it’s ever going to be easy for him but imagine having Jamison Gibson-Park and Bundee Aki as inside-outside, Robbie Henshaw right there, Caelan Doris further in – he’s on a really good hinge of experience I think. So while his experience isn’t great, I think the people around him have fantastic experience.”
The key word there is hinge. The first Schmidt heard of Prendergast was when the 21-year-old was starring for Ireland’s grand slam under-20s two seasons ago, so he filed the name away. He might not have reckoned on fishing it out again so soon, but in the circumstances it’s a bonus for him: a hinge he can work on, and loosen.
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At the other end of the cast is Cian Healy, about to stand alone on the pedestal of most capped Ireland player – on 134 – a man Schmidt came to rely on at Leinster. But he hadn’t budgeted for the loosehead overtaking Brian O’Driscoll’s cap record.
“No, but I massively respect it,” Schmidt says. “Loosehead – he’s up against the caps record holder for the Wallabies as well [James Slipper]. I think that’s a great thing as well for loosehead props, maybe there’s something to be said about them. They know how to get that longevity. With Slips playing at the weekend and Cian Healy I’m pretty sure that we’ll catch up afterwards and those two will share a bit of hydration.”
It would be a surprise if Schmidt doesn’t have a quick chat with Prendergast too. Just to see if the landmines laid were sidestepped or trod on. Either way it will shape how this Test turns out.
