Sexton: Saturday’s Game Will Be Massive Reference Point For Us

It was not the end to the calendar year that Ireland wanted, going down 24-13 to a scrum-propelled South Africa team that convincingly claimed their first win at the Aviva Stadium since 2012.

Ireland assistant coach Sexton had an impressive playing record against the Springboks, winning five out of seven Tests. From earning his second cap in 2009’s 15-10 victory at Croke Park through to the Rugby World Cup quarter-final triumph in Paris just over two years ago.

He knows what it takes to beat one of the giants of the international rugby, and now with his full-time move into the coaches’ box, there will be a huge collective drive to bring Ireland back to their best, performance-wise, in 2026.

“In many ways, our (coaches’) focus is already on the Six Nations,” he said, speaking at the announcement of Laya healthcare’s landmark naming rights partnership with the RDS and Leinster Rugby.

“I think Saturday’s game in particular will be a massive reference point for us as we play South Africa this time next year again. So to see the team, how much they can improve and evolve, it’ll be great.

“I’m sure South Africa will come back, and it’ll be a great match for us to say, ‘Look how far we’ve come in these 12 months’, or hopefully we have.”

With a big Irish involvement in tbe successful British & Irish Lions series in Australia, both from a playing and coaching perspective, there was a staggered start to the new season, and losing the Gallagher Cup clash with New Zealand in Chicago was an early setback.

Andy Farrell’s men bounced back to kick off the Quilter Nations Series with comprehensive home wins over Japan (41-10) and Australia (46-19). Their attack tallied up 12 tries with ten different try scorers.

This November international window saw Paddy McCarthy and Tom Farrell win their first senior caps, making it 16 Test debutants for Ireland over the past twelve months. Two of those, Sam Prendergast and Tommy O’Brien, started against South Africa.

There have been opportunities this month for Jamie Osborne and Mack Hansen to both feature at full-back, the latter crowning his first international start in the number 15 jersey with a fantastic first-half hat-trick against the Wallabies.

A groin injury unfortunately hampered Stuart McCloskey’s progress after lining out at inside centre against both New Zealand and Australia, while Ryan Baird has hit a rich vein of form, in the aftermath of Peter O’Mahony’s retirement, to make six successive starts at blindside flanker.

Sexton referenced the losses of O’Mahony, Cian Healy, and Conor Murray, who all hung up their boots earlier this year, and the likes of himself and Keith Earls before that. It is easy to forget that Caelan Doris has only captained the team 13 times, and Dan Sheehan twice.

With the current transitional phase, there are some definite similarities with 2021 when Ireland lost to Wales and France before things clicked for them against England, which was also two years out from a Rugby World Cup.

Reflecting back on that period when Farrell was only twelve months into the job, Sexton said: “I honestly believed it at the time we could see it in our performances. We were having some amazing phases of play and we just weren’t quite finishing them.

“With sport in general, the results dictate the narrative. It’s very hard to look past results in professional sport, I understand that.

“But at the time, I remember thinking we were on the right track. Andy came in and he didn’t rip up Joe (Schmidt’s) philosophy altogether.

“He took lots of the good parts of it but he changed a good few things, and some of the bigger picture things was a massive change.

“The big change now is, I suppose, we’re trying to develop our game but also we’ve lost probably 600 caps worth of experience out of the building in the space of 18 months, two years.

“In terms of what’s been asked of players, it’s different to what it was before because now they have to be the leaders. They have to take responsibility for the team, they have to drive the week, they have to do all the things that leaders do.

“That’s the big change, and it’s something that we’re working on massively at the moment. With our game, I think bits that went really well against Australia, against Japan at times, we were probably a bit undercooked against New Zealand when you look back.

“Then obviously against South Africa, at times it looked like it was going to go well and just one thing after another in the game that led to a crazy match, really.”

Delving more into the four-try loss to the World champions, Sexton was asked about the pressure exerted on the Irish scrum which coughed up two yellow cards and a penalty try, and six penalties in all.

The former Ireland captain has full confidence in scrum coach John Fogarty to get the set-piece firing on all cylinders for the Six Nations, especially as he has not seen the likes of Tadhg Furlong and Andrew Porter have too many off days at the coalface.

Asked if he is concerned about it, he replied: “No, because in my eyes it’s a one-off. That’s never happened to our scrum before.

“I know we’ve got good people involved in that department, and a lot of work has been done there. So they will come up with solutions, they’ll come up with fixes.

“There were a couple of brilliant scrums that we didn’t get rewarded for at key parts of the game, which was disappointing. But sometimes it’s very hard to change when the scrum has gone a certain way for an early part of the match.

“If you fix it for a couple, it’s almost unbelievable, and we don’t get the rub of the green. I’m sure the lads will fix it, and, as I said, it’s never happened before, so I wouldn’t expect it to happen again soon.”

The tactical kicking, and the fight to win the aerial battle, resulted in a lot of back-and-forth play at times, with South Africa coming out on top in that area, either winning the ball in the air or making it scrappy possession that often led to scrums.

Their half-backs Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu and Cobus Reinach kicked 19 times between them, for 376.6 metres, with two of the out-half’s four restarts retained. In contrast, Ireland failed to retain possession from five of their restarts.

Jamison Gibson-Park was the game’s dominant kicker, his 12 kicks covering over 300 metres and including some excellent clearances. The hosts had got plenty of joy from contestable kicks against Australia, but not so on this occasion with Damian Willemse standing out from full-back.

“The ball in the air was huge,” acknowledged Sexton. “I suppose the kicking game now is as much about receiving kicks as it is sending them as well.

“Obviously, you think about the quality of the kick when we’re talking about the kicking game, but in terms of receiving, it was something that South Africa did very well.

“We were down to 12 men and they were still kicking the ball in the air, which just shows where the game has gone with not being allowed to escort back. The rules have just flipped fully.”

One of the positives coming out of the contest for Ireland was the character that they showed, especially in the second half when James Ryan’s 20-minute red card, and the team’s four sin-binnings, could have had them flagging come the final quarter.

Instead, they managed to close out the match on the front foot, and it is something that should stand to them when they travel to Paris and London during the Six Nations’ opening three rounds.

Fifteen of Saturday’s squad were involved in the memorable 2024 win over France in Marseille, and in addition, Robbie Henshaw, Joe McCarthy, Hugo Keenan, and Calvin Nash are all to come back from injury.

Les Bleus will be launching their title defence against Farrell’s side on Thursday, February 5, while England, who have moved up to third in the World Rugby rankings, are coming off the back of four autumn victories out of four.

“In terms of the character that was shown, it was absolutely outstanding,” Sexton said of Ireland’s dogged resistance while down to 12, 13, and 14 players at different stages. They also lost O’Brien, Baird, and Hansen to various injuries.

“I think that is something that we can definitely take away from the game as a positive. The guts, the determination. As a supporter, that is the minimum that you want to see from any Irish team, and they produced it in spades.

“It’s something that we’ve been referencing, and something that the lads showed. They showed unbelievable fight, problem-solving, just guts. I was pretty proud on Saturday after the game in terms of being associated with that group of men.

“It was pretty inspiring from that point of view, but also you’ve got to go, ‘Okay, how did we get ourselves into that situation? What can we do better?’.

“There’s always a balance. I think as coaches, that is something that they’d be quite good at. They can be people on one hand and then be coaches on another and say, ‘Very proud, but lads, this isn’t good enough here’.

“There’s definitely a balance to all that, but, like I said, to hold them out with 12 men, with 13 men, to win the second half (6-5), all those little positives, we definitely have to use them going forward.”