This is the first time I can remember when Ireland have gone to Paris as favourites to win and when that expectation has been fully justified. Good players with leaders in the key areas, confidence high after strong results in Europe, guided by one of the best international coaches — Ireland tick all the boxes. That creates new pressures because Ireland will be viewed as the leading championship contenders. We have traditionally viewed the “even” years, when we have to go to Twickenham and Paris, as the lesser of our opportunities to win a Grand Slam. That is no longer valid.
If there is a player who sums up Ireland right now it is Tadhg Furlong. It is strange for me as a wing to write this of a front-row forward but he has become the man I most look forward to watching. We know that in the professional era props have had to develop their skill set beyond shoring up the scrum. In Ireland, Furlong’s Leinster teammate, Cian Healy, was in the vanguard of the next generation — adding the ability to act as a human wrecking ball in the loose to basic scrummaging skills. With Furlong, however, we are witnessing a paradigm shift.
He can scrum well and is a strong ball carrier, but his threat in the latter role is magnified by his distribution skills, which are exceptional for a prop. His ability to deliver a perfectly timed and weighted pass to a back running an inside channel means he holds the inside defender every time. That creates a headache for an opposition defence coach. However, it’s his ability to read the game that sets him apart. Instead of being cajoled into position during phase play by the nine or 10 he often takes on the role of chief organiser. He’s always animated when organising the defensive line - Jack McGrath is also strong in this department - and has a sense of where opportunity or danger lie.
There was no better evidence than in last week’s Montpellier-Leinster game when he got himself in position to haul down Nemani Nadolo when Frans Steyn offloaded inside to the big Fiji wing and the try line beckoned. Furlong and Dany Priso were the only props on the recent list of European Player of the Year nominees and if they were picking the winner today the Irishman would be my man.
The only real selection issue for Joe Schmidt is likely to be his centre combination and back three. In the latter, I get the feeling Leinster’s rising star, Jordan Larmour would deal with the step up to international rugby with the ease he’s shown at every juncture so far in his career. However, Schmidt may see Ireland’s second outing against Italy as a de-risked chance to test Larmour. The Ireland coach will almost certainly trust in Rob Kearney’s management of the backfield at 15 in Paris. Kearney has always reacted well to competition and has plenty from Leinster’s latest wunderkind. Keith Earls, so good with Munster in Europe, and Jacob Stockdale, who excelled in November, look the likely wings.
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Inside them, expect Schmidt to go with a midfield partnership of Bundee Aki and Robbie Henshaw. There is no doubting the pair’s robustness as ball-carriers and defensive units but I wonder if the combination could limit Ireland’s game plan. Aki will get a team over the gainline but the advantage from that is offset by the inaccuracy of his distribution, particularly when passing left to right.
I would be interested to see Chris Farrell line up at 13 alongside Henshaw. When the Munster centre started against Argentina in November he looked the part. Have a look on YouTube of Stockdale’s first try in that game, set up by a beautiful sleight of hand by Farrell that puts Jonathan Sexton through the hole in the Pumas’ defence. Until then, we did not associate Farrell with such artistry.
This is a good selection dilemma for Ireland because when the D’Arcy-O’Driscoll double act came to an end in 2014 we wondered how we were ever going to fill the void in the middle. Now to Aki, Henshaw and Farrell, we can add the injured Garry Ringrose, Stuart McCloskey of Ulster and my own preferred candidate Leinster’s Joey Carbery.
I wrote last year that France had the worst coach in the Six Nations. At the end of 2017, those who run French rugby woke up to this and sacked Guy Noves. The problem is that his replacement, Jacques Brunel, is not much better. I’ll be surprised if he radically changes France’s simplistic attacking pattern. Where he can make a difference is defence, with a more rigid system that sees less players going it alone and shooting out of the line.
If Ireland win, and with home fixtures to follow against Italy, Wales and Scotland, attention will turn to the final-round match at Twickenham on March 17. England are difficult to judge because their record at international level since Eddie Jones took over is so strong, while the recent form of their clubs in Europe has been average at best. The ledger from the Anglo-Irish match-ups in this season’s Champions Cup, for example, reads Ireland seven wins to England one. The Six Nations does not exist in a vacuum and that must count for something.
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I also wonder if Jones is a victim of his own success. Those first two seasons — with a Grand Slam, then a Six Nations title and a series whitewash in Australia — were so transformative that they significantly raised expectations after the 2015 World Cup disaster. Looking at their peformances in the autumn, you would not say that England went back but they did not make the advances that Ireland and Scotland enjoyed.
I played against the England team that won the 2003 World Cup and in the two-year build-up to that you could see where they were going and how they were getting there. I do not yet have the same feeling yet about this group of players. We’ll have a better idea by St Patrick’s Day.
ON TV SATURDAY
France v Ireland
BBC1, 4.45pm