Kidney, Failure or Fan-tastic? The Mote speaks!

Ireland’s performance in the Six Nations was a bit of a curates egg with much finger pointing at under fire coach Declan Kidney, not least a few heated debates on this site. 

We challenged our, all too, regular contributor, the Mote, to put his case and here it is –

Before we look at Kidney we must first consider the objectives the I R F U would have given him when he accepted the appointment as Irish Coach.

Realistic objectives could have been :-

1. Win a Triple Crown, Six Nations Championship, and Grand Slam.
2. Finish no lower than third in the Championship.
3. Elevate to and maintain Ireland within top Six of the World Rankings
4. Reach Quarter Finals of the World Cup.

If those were the objectives to then what extent does he have the freedom to experiment with players? And how inhibited are his selections by the nature and number of contracts awarded by the IRFU? My conclusion is he has very little choice!

Secondly, we must loo at the team he inherited after the last World Cup with the following players required replacement before  this World Cup.

In the backs  Dempsey, Hickey, Horgan  and possibly Stringer and O’Gara. He also would have been assessing alternatives to D’Arcy and O’Driscoll.

In the forwards – the Front Row needed to be replaced it being obvious that Hayes, Horan and Flannery would be and could be to old or too injury prone to play a major role in the World Cup. Similarly, and for the same reasons,  replacements had to be found for Easterby Quinlan and Wallace in the back row.

Since his appointment the first three objectives have been achived .

With regard to squad development he has introduced Sexton at outhalf and O’Leary and Reddan at scrumhalf.

Personally I have my own preferances, O’Leary looked the part but has failed to develop and his pass seems to have got slower and as a consequence the backs failed to function against Italy this year. Reddan and Stringer are inter-changeable but predictable which provided the intercept in the game against England. Neither Reddan nor Stringer offer a basis for a plan B plan A being the game controlled at outhalf by either Sexton or O’Gara whereas I believe Boss would provide a Plan B.

At fullback Ireland have a choice of either Kearney, Murphy or Earls on the wing Bowe, Trimble,Earls and Fitzgerald.

He has developed a front row of Healy, Best and Ross with Court, Buckley and Cronin  in reserve. In the second row he has looked at Touhy and has Cullen and Toner as possible replacements for games of lower intensity where an assured line out possession is priority and then there is the old spoiler himself M O’Driscoll.

In the back row the squad players include Ferris, Heaslip, O’Brien, McLaughin, Jennings, Wallace
Leamy, McCarthy, he has also played Henry  and Faloon has been assessed while playing for the Wolfhounds despite the fact that neither Faloon nor Henry would be automatic ,first on the team sheet players for Ulster

The major back row concern is that many of those included as back row players are either blindside (6s) or 8s and there is a lack of an obvious replacement for D Wallace.

During Kidney’s period of stewardship the development side the Wolfhounds won the Churchill Cup. Cave and Whitten were capped against America in the same year.

My own view is that Kidney has a better understanding of the resources available than many give him credit for and knows exactly what he is looking for in a player at International level – PASSION.

Pace, skill and being competent are not enough nor is being as good as the current incumbent. The player must be better and what he wants is passion – a passion which can transform itself in to an aggressive determination to succeed .

Those who advocate he should chop and change, blood any number of players, should consider the nature of his appointment and then ask themselves as to whether those players they consider should have been blooded at International level have that passion?

Look at Ferris on the field he has a fire inside. Do they see that fire in those they consider should have been played or blooded?.

They should also consider the Welsh. The Dragons have 11 Welsh Internationals in their squad I am sure the Scarlets would have a similar number and both the Ospreys and the Blues would exceed that number. There must be 50 – 60 Welsh Internationals in the Magners League and this excludes the exiles. The Welsh have thrown International Caps around like confetti over the last 10 years. Have they been as successful as Ireland? No! Are they going into the World Cup better prepared? I doubt it.

My major question mark about Kidney is his continuing perseverance with Paddy Wallace as a substitute,  and an obvious lack of cover at inside centre, which at this time seems to be a player who uses a different mode of defence (rush ) than that used by the Irish team (drift). I sense that should D’Arcy become unavailable O’Driscoll would play inside centre with either Bowe, Trimble, Earls or McFadden at outside centre.

Those who think Kidney is a fool seriously underestimate the task he faced and fail to recognise the  qualities he seeks in players and his understanding of player resources available to him and only after the World Cup will we know if he is a failure.

The jury awaits the evidence.

The Mote

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