Andy Farrell, Ireland’s head coach, says that his team has “a lot of work” ahead next year’s World Cup, despite the great 2022.
Saturday night’s victory at home over Australia was a hat trick of Autumn Series wins. It began with South Africa beating the world champions.
This was after the Irish won a first-ever away series victory over New Zealand in the summer.
Farrell replied, “With a lot of to do”, when Farrell was asked where they stood in 2023.
“That’s great, and that is the reality. There are certain aspects in our game that we’d love to improve, just as there were always.
“We can analyze that game [the win over Australia] We can’t wait for the cows to come home, but we must continue to improve all aspects of our game.
“We need to be more innovative as coaches so when we come in for Six Nations, we expect to improve our game while pushing forward.”
Ranking system in the world is “a little bit irrelevant”
Saturday night’s match at Dublin’s Aviva Stadium was tense and competitive. Substitution fly-half Ross Byrne scored a 77-minute penalty. This was only after Johnny Sexton, captain, had been injured minutes before kickoff. The hosts won 13-10.
Farrell and his players had a great year. It also maintained their position as the top team in the world. However, the head coach insists that he does not pay any attention to what he called an “irrelevant world ranking system”.
He said, “I really don’t understand how the points system functions.”
“It is not something I can really bother trying to solve because it is somewhat irrelevant in the sense we want to continue improving our performance, pushing forward and testing us.”
“But the men that merit the praises are the lads [the players] You put in the effort.
“They have earned their right to be up there but they have also earned the right not to be shot down.” In that respect, the pressures will be great for us.”
“The Autumn games were great for us”
Johnny Sexton was forced to withdraw from the match due to a calf strain. Jack Crowley assumed the role of fly-half and Byrne took his place on the bench.
Farrell was sympathetic for his skipper who had missed Fiji’s victory the week before due to a dead leg but said he enjoyed the challenge.
He was also positive about the three wins in the Autumn Series, even though they were not very eye-catching.
“It is not ideal” [losing Sexton so late on] He said that it was a great experience for the group to see in such a window.
“I think that the Autumn has been great. We have not played our best rugby, but we were able to play South Africa. This was a challenge that everyone wanted to see us succeed in, and we did it very well.
“We had more chance against Fiji and we learned some great lessons.
“We haven’t toured Australia in five years. We don’t accept any information that is being reported about their form from the media because we know that their Australian mentality dictates that even if they have to back down, they will still come up with a performance.
“I just told the boys that they need to get used it. We need to improve and raise our standards. People coming to Aviva expect us to play at the highest level, so we have to do better.