'Subconsciously, I guess I will never know' - Andy Farrell and Joe Schmidt not burdened by series hindsight

RTÉ News​

2 days ago

In the end, the Test series mismatch turned out to be anything but.
Australia's 22-12 win against the British and Irish Lions on Saturday saved their blushes as far as a series whitewash was concerned, and appropriately left the aggregate score over three Tests at 68-67 in the Lions favour.
Obviously, that combined scoreline is more of a quirky fact than a deep analysis of the tour, but this series was plainly more competitive than most people expected.
When the Lions were 24-5 in front in the early stages of the second half in Brisbane, it felt like the series was already over. Looking back, the Wallabies might have been a minute away from winning it themselves.
The Australian teams that pitched up in Melbourne and Sydney were far removed from the squad that looked feeble and unorganised at Suncorp Stadium.
Of course, they were without Will Skelton that evening in Brisbane, and the La Rochelle second row was at his absolute best in the second and third Tests, bringing his obvious physicality to the game, but also turning it into a street fight, constantly testing the boundaries of the referees Andrea Piardi and Nika Amashukeli.
Skelton was the panto villain. Every time he was near the ball, the game was at a simmer. Grappling with players off the ball, the cheap shots were late enough to get under the skin of the opposition, but not dirty enough to warrant anything more than a talking to. More of this, please.
If only we could scratch that first Test from the records, and go back to Brisbane next Saturday for a proper decider.
With just one international behind them against Fiji, and their frontline players held back from playing against the Lions in their warm-up games, the Wallabies looked under cooked for the opening game of the series.
On Saturday night, Joe Schmidt was asked if his side could have been more battle hardened for the first Test at Suncorp Stadium.
"Maybe, but I'm not really going to look back at maybes," the Wallabies boss said.
"Yeah, I guess it just is what it is. I'm not great at looking back and having regrets, I'm just trying to plan a way forward."
To continue the theme of ifs, buts and maybes, Saturday's game in Sydney being a dead rubber does have to be taken into account.
The Lions squad looked leggy in their final game of a gruelling tour, and the celebrations of clinching the series last week with a game to spare must have played a factor in how they prepared for the week.
"Subconsciously, I guess I will never know the answer to that question," Farrell (below) said when asked if his side would have been more dialled in for the game, had it been a series decider.
"I hope not. I hope not. Otherwise we are not being true to ourselves in everything we talked about this week. I certainly hope not.
"Everything is in hindsight isn't it. We built the week up pretty good, I thought.
"There are a few days off there. Training application on Tuesday and Wednesday was pretty good, as was yesterday. It's just the story of the game that got away from us in the end.
"I wouldn't have thought it was just one game too many. Who am I to know? These lads have been playing for how many months. They were certainly up for the game but the best team won."
The theory that the Wallabies wanted Saturday's game more can be backed up by the contrasting reactions to the lightning delay, which saw play halted for 38 minutes in the early stages of the second half.
TV viewers could get a decent insight into how the two groups were treating it. In the Lions changing room, players were told to relax, with cameras showing Finn Russell browsing on his phone, and Tadhg Furlong and Bundee Aki taking a break on bean-bags (below).
"At one stage it looked like it was going be 45 minutes then it was pulled back to 30 minutes. There were updates constantly coming in but the lads stayed relaxed enough, had five minutes of a warm-up and got the show back on the road.
"What came off the back of that is Australia hit the ground running and thoroughly deserved their win," Farrell added.
The Lions head coach insisted it was "utter rubbish" that the relaxed approach left his players complacent and unprepared for the game restarting.
Schmidt, however, had his weather delay strategy ready before the game.
"We had been warned that there might be a bit of lightning, so we had a plan and with that plan we made sure that guys kept moving," Schmidt explained.
"We had different guys rotating on and off the bikes, we'd a couple of bikes. We'd four balls in the changing room so guys could throw them around, so that guys could stay connected.
"The rest of the time, it was just trying to get us organised for the restart."
For a series that was decided with a game to spare, the last week has felt like one in which a fire has been lit under rugby union in Australia, and any idle talk of their place on the Lions rotation being in jeopardy now seems unthinkable after they brought more than 220,000 people through the gates across three Tests.
And with a World Cup on the horizon in two years, the Wallabies boss is hopeful his team have started to reconnect with the Australian public.
"The crowds have been absolutely awesome," Schmidt continued.
"We knew that wasn't all for us, but we just started to see more and more yellow as the tour went on, and even this morning, a lot of the players were meeting up with friends and family and you just saw a lot of gold, gold scarves, gold jerseys and people who were supporting us.
"It does, I believe, give the players a little bit of a lift. It makes them a little bit accountable as well. They feel like we're getting the support, we've got to make sure we keep earning it."