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Jan 31

Neil Francis: The fitness of Ireland’s answer to Tom Brady is the key to whether our Six Nations dreams are scripted by Walter Mitty or Walt Disney -…

Fitness Comments Off on Neil Francis: The fitness of Ireland’s answer to Tom Brady is the key to whether our Six Nations dreams are scripted by Walter Mitty or Walt Disney -…

There is a little bit of an NFL flavour to our Six Nations preview this week. There are similarities and parallels in each sport.

have watched Tom Brady play live four times and hundreds of other occasions on television. I feel as if I know him - but I don't. I don't think I will get to meet him in this life - maybe in heaven if there isn't a VIP section. If I do, I will ask him this question: How on earth did you manage to get the Tampa Bay Buccaneers to the Super Bowl in 2021? He might not even know the answer himself.

Tampa haven't been to the play-offs since 2007 and while they have a pretty sexy roster on both sides of the ball there is one indisputable fact: they would not have made it to the Super Bowl without Brady running the show.

All of Brady's stats this season are pretty decent, but there were always seven or eight quarterbacks in the league with better numbers than him. Strangely, though, only one of them, Patrick Mahomes, is playing in the Super Bowl next Sunday. If Brady had retired or stayed another season in New England, the entire Buccaneers roster would be brushing up on their BBQ skills right now.

What I liked most about Tom Brady's contract with the Buccs was that it was a 'you eat what you kill' type of contract. His two-year $50m deal had very few guarantees. It was a heavily incentivised pay as you play contract. Brady would have to play in every game and get his team to the Super Bowl to earn his $25m per annum. The money means nothing to him but no one can say now that he didn't earn it. As a 43-year-old he featured in every play in every game of this crazy season. He plays against a gunslinger next Sunday who was four when Brady won his first Super Bowl. It is an incredible story.

At the age of 43, Brady is the only person in elite sport who can say it's just a number. It's only a number if you can play every week.

Any team in any competition can say that they have the potential to win that competition that season. Last season Tampa were probably saying that they could win the Super Bowl. They won seven games and the play-offs were a distant hazy mirage. This year they said the same but this time there was somebody on board who knew how to win and how to get his team to win. Walter Mitty to Walt Disney - from dreaming to having someone who can make your dream come true.

Over the years, Johnny Sexton has had plenty of comparisons with Brady. The truth is, though, that Johnny has not had the same unblemished injury profile as the American. If you looked under Sexton's bonnet you would have to void the warranty.

Sexton himself will tell you that Brady doesn't have to make any tackles. That is a salient point, as half of Sexton's injuries are from contact. Sexton will also point out that Brady isn't, under any circumstances, a running quarterback. In fact he doesn't run at all - he stays in the pocket. It is almost comical now that when the heat comes on Brady, and he gets flushed out of the pocket, he just falls to the ground before he gets hit. Sexton's running game, though, is a major part of his repertoire.

This is the more discomfiting aspect of Sexton's injury profile. In the last five years, every time he has picked up a 'niggle' or a 'pull' it is as a result of extending himself. Too often when Sexton gets to full pace, he pulls up.

Sometimes Sexton gets through the game with minor adjustments. Conor Murray has scored 25 points from conversions and penalties that Sexton could not take while he was still on the pitch. If Sexton attempted those penalties or conversions he would tear whatever muscle is compromised. Brady doesn't have to tackle, kick or pin his ears back and that is why Sexton's body is beginning to disintegrate. Sexton is all gas, no brakes.

Every year the Irish squad assembles just before the Six Nations and it is true, particularly recently, that they have had the potential to win the Championship. I can say with a reasonable degree of confidence that Ireland would have won nothing in the last ten years if Sexton had not been around.

Imagine if, when Sexton was sent back to St Mary's to get a bit of game time at the start of his Leinster career, he had taken the regressive move and just called it a day. There has been some good quality in the Ireland squad over the last ten years, but without their most important player in the most important position on the field, it would have been a fairly fallow period.

Sexton's workload, as a consequence, is extremely well managed and the player himself, with others, spends hours every day in and out of season working his body to the point where every sinew is stretched and strengthened so they won't give when the heat comes on.

That work goes unrewarded a good portion of the time. It is important to note that superstars remain superstars because they ruthlessly and methodically keep their body lithe and supple. The 36-year-old LA Lakers superstar LeBron James makes sure he keeps his $153m four-year contract current by spending $1m per annum on preventative rehabilitation and habilitation.

Hours and hours of deep tissue massage, stretching, muscle conditioning, core strengthening, breathing classes, flexion and oblique pilates - all just to keep his body in prime condition. Recovery classes, etc, after the game . . . $153m!

It seems like every season now there is a 'Sexton in race to be fit for Championship' headline. How many matches will he play in the Championship this year or next year if he is selected?

Let's not forget one thing - this is now Ireland's testing ground. In 2023 we will lose to South Africa in the pool stages of the Rugby World Cup and then we will lose in the quarter-final to Pool A winners New Zealand. Our lust for success can only be satisfied in the Six Nations for the foreseeable future.

There will come a tipping point where Sexton's value to the side and his singular attitude to winning is overwrought by the inefficacy of his corporeal self. Johnny runs the show on and off the field and there is no one to replace him either in his own position or in his leadership role. People who say 'just give the captaincy to James Ryan' have simply no idea.

If Sexton only plays a part role or is inhibited from displaying the full range of his talent and experience on the field, that will be reflected in Ireland's position in the final table.

I looked at England's 28-man squad last week and then I looked at the players who did not make the squad. Their depth is astonishing. We have just about 20 international standard players available to us. If Eddie Jones was given an option to pick any of them for England he wouldn't. Ireland's chances this year depend entirely on Sexton being able to perform up to and past his limit.

Ireland have struggled badly with the absence of Tadhg Furlong. That sort of loss doesn't bother France or England but to us it is a mortal blow. Furlong survived last night against Scarlets so he should be straight back into the Ireland 23-man squad, and we can repeat the same decade of the Rosary for the safe passage of Sexton through the Six Nations.

Having our best players available is one thing, using them effectively is quite another.

I watched an interview with Robert Saleh, the newly installed head coach of the lamentable New York Jets. It is my turn next year!

Saleh is a very interesting guy who was the best defensive co-ordinator in the league with the San Francisco 49ers. He was asked who he had picked as his new defensive co-ordinator. After going to watch the Jets play at the Meadowlands in November 2019 I wasn't sure they even had one.

Whoever Saleh chose simply wouldn't be anywhere near as good as the new boss so could the new guy get his defence to be as good as he was at it?

Saleh struggled to give a convincing answer and internally you could see the wheels turning in his head that this particular aspect of coaching was no longer his immediate concern. He was now the big picture guy - mentality, strategy, philosophy and identity - that sort of shit.

The shift on camera didn't flummox him, but the jump to head coach, even for someone as talented as Saleh, is perplexing.

Andy Farrell was pretty good at what he did. He knows the defensive systems, how to close down the opposition, how to put people on the floor, auxiliary motivation and selection and he is somebody who is more than handy to have around when the team looks flat.

Farrell's first year as head coach was less than impressive. On the evidence of what the team produced it is kind of difficult to put the toothpaste back into the tube.

Strategically I wasn't sure exactly what they were trying to do. Farrell is not as good as Joe. Simon Easterby is not as good as Farrell. John Fogarty is not as good as Greg Feek. Mike Catt is not as good as Stuart Lancaster or Stephen Larkham. The only unquantifiable is how good is Paul O'Connell?

This is the season Farrell makes the jump from defence coach to head coach. There is no safety net of learning from mistakes or looking at the video and being better next week. If Farrell has Sexton and Furlong in his team he has a chance of having a decent season.

The first stanza of the Six Nations is difficult - away to Wales and home to France. They are both winnable games but only if the head coach has made the successful transition from being a defence coach.

At the Six Nations launch Farrell permitted himself an indulgence by stating he would love to have a pop at England on Paddy's weekend. That sentiment was straight out of Walter J Mitty's manual.

What happened to 'we will take each game as it comes'. The England game could be a forlorn shot at redemption after another underwhelming season or in Mitty world a Grand Slam decider. Yeah . . .

PS: Jerry Kiernan RIP - A special breed of man.

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Neil Francis: The fitness of Ireland's answer to Tom Brady is the key to whether our Six Nations dreams are scripted by Walter Mitty or Walt Disney -...

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