1
Johnny Sexton left kicking himself before World Cup showdown
By Online Editors
Ireland five-eighth Johnny Sexton cut a lonely figure on Friday as he stalked around an empty Tokyo Stadium ahead of their World Cup quarter-final against New Zealand, but he was not going to change the habit of a lifetime.
Sexton was the only player to turn up to the stadium for the side's official "captain's run" after the team had held a training session earlier in the day, with the 34-year-old having to practice with kicking and skills coach Richie Murphy.
"I didn't want to break routine before a big game and not kick in the stadium before the game," Sexton told reporters at the stadium.
Continue reading below...
"I wasn't going to start anything new now. So I just wanted to get my preparation going as usual.
"I had the bus to myself. I had the pitch to myself, which was a bit strange, but I can chill out on the bus on the way back."
Murphy said the coaching staff had been happy with their run on Friday morning and left it up to the individual players as to whether they made the long journey out to western Tokyo for a final walk through.
Ireland have never advanced to the semi-finals at the World Cup, having lost six quarter-finals, and while they have beaten the All Blacks in two of their three previous matches, are not expected to break that curse on Saturday.
Sexton, however, said the entire team had been focused on a potential quarter-final showdown with either the All Blacks or Springboks for a long time and they were quietly confident they could advance.
"We look forward to getting out there on the big stage and showing what we can do against a team that has not lost a game for two World Cups," he said.
"It will be an enormous challenge and one we're excited about and eager to make the people at home really proud."
While it could be the last match for coach Joe Schmidt, who is stepping down after the World Cup, Sexton said he hoped it would not be the last time he plays with halfback Conor Murray.
"It has been a pleasure to play alongside him," Sexton said.
"I hope we get many more together but at the end of the World Cup you guys (the media) will probably start to come for our heads because we will be too old and the next batch has to come through.
"I can see it already, but I hope we have a few more years together."
AAP
In other news:
Trending on RugbyPass
2
All Blacks assistant labels Italy game 'messy'
3
Robertson says Italy sensed All Blacks' weaknesses
4
All Blacks player ratings vs Italy
5
Latest Comments
BB can’t pass? Right…
Go to commentsEven the 20/30 cappers did too I reckon.
IDK, I think Jordan has a limited life span in this side unless he can develop more to his game. Like you go on to mention, I think theyres more important things to worry about than the effectiveness of someone's extra strings, or secondary components to their game.
Bash backs are Fosters thing, and to a large part they've made it work. Theyre now one of the best teams in the world.
They boy's trucked it up a bit against Italy in the redzone, and against France, wasn't that effective without the right players probably.
Try and take a look at it this way. Dissapointed Havili and Blackadder were in the side? Havili despite clearly shown that he can't do what the team needs at 12 was kept on for the RWC. Back goes down and he brings in Blackadder who doesn't play. Refuses to drop Christie when he should and look who starts this season. Beauden Barret not playing well enough to keep his 10 jersey but we gotta keep him in the side. Weve only got one 8, we stuff developing another I'll just play Ardie every game.
This years team wasn't burdened overly with injuries but they were in every position Razor might have wanted to try and development, severely limiting options. I'm not defending Razor as there was also plenty of other opportunity to make up for it and he was a little gunshy, but I'm also not going to overly criticise him because he chose cohesion over a black slate.
I think more and more people are on board with it being time to try alternatives, but then again, how would they have reacted to a loss against Italy? 😉
Go to comments