Emmet Moloney writes for the 'The Irish Farmers Journal' and is a former sports columnist with 'The Kerryman'.
Twelve months ago the Irish rugby team limped through the autumn internationals. Times have changed though and Declan Kidney’s men are ready for Australia, Emmet Moloney writes...

The highlight of a poor few weeks last November for the Irish rugby team was a tepid win over Argentina, securing our top-eight status in the world. That was the focus a year ago, ensuring we did not have to qualify for the 2011 World Cup. It was classic Declan Kidney. A focus was created and we delivered an ugly victory over the Argies and were not at full tilt or close to it against New Zealand.

That was the target then, and it was achieved. Twelve months on, Ireland rugby is in a very different place as erstwhile Leinster star Rocky Elsom returns to these shores as captain of an Australia side that finished a distant third in this year’s Tri Nations.
The targets for Ireland are a little more ambitious now. We are champions of Europe and Declan Kidney is firmly established in his role as coach/facilitator/strategist/psychologist or whatever it is he actually does. Whatever it is, his record is phenomenal. Ireland have never reached the last four of the World Cup and that is probably Kidney’s long-term goal. He has already won an underage World Cup so his ambitions are not slight.

Between now and 2011 Kidney will try to make Ireland exactly what England were in the lead-up to their win in 2003 – the best team in Europe and a team capable of consistently beating Southern Hemisphere sides, home and away. Sunday is the first test and despite the lack of a warm-up game (the Aussies have played two), Kidney has already proven himself the master of preparation for games like this.

Time and time again Munster would come out and win huge games after international breaks or after a string of bad performances under the mercurial Corkman. Kidney seems to have figured out just how to pace a team to peak for the important matches. And the autumn internationals are made for him. We can and should beat Australia. We can and will beat South Africa – that is the game Kidney really has in mind. They are the world champions and plenty of Irish players have scores to settle with them, dating back most recently to the Lions’ series.

Do you think Ronan O’Gara won’t be straining at the leash to play the Springboks? Paul O’Connell? Brian O’Driscoll? That’s going to be the game of the series.

The Aussies aren’t the ideal warm-up game for us and it would be insulting them to suggest they are a warm-up. We haven’t beaten them that often, although we have beaten them more than any other of the big three. For some reason they don’t hold the same awe and mystique that attaches itself to the Boks and the All Blacks. So our fear factor is lessened and we always fancy our chances against them. Despite being together for just two weeks or so, we’re stronger than them.

The fly in the Irish ointment is our injury crisis in the front row. We are struggling for established internationals here and only John Hayes, himself out of the game for almost two months, is an obvious selection – and a rusty one.

This will manifest itself in the scrum. If Jerry Flannery doesn’t make it the loss will be acute. But we are used to this – most opposing teams target the Irish scrum. Cian Healy is a man for the future so we can only hope it hasn’t come too soon for him. He will be in at the deep end at some stage over the next three weeks. I suspect he will survive and thrive.

Declan Kidney is a hard man to pin down. He appears to be cautious yet surprises every now and again with what looks on the surface to be a risky gamble. They invariably pay off. His decision to call new players into the 31-man squad that didn’t make the original 39 is classic Kidney. It keeps everyone on their toes and sends messages to quite a few. Of the ones kicked to touch for now, Shane Horgan could feel slightly aggrieved. He is a proven international and is playing his best rugby in three or four years. But he is now behind the likes of Earls, Fitzgerald and Tommy Bowe for the wing spots.

Kidney always shows loyalty to those in possession of a jersey for a bit longer than most coaches. This loyalty is usually repaid in spades. Ronan O’Gara will probably be the latest to benefit from this trait.

As I write this the team has not been announced for Sunday but I expect to see Ronan at number 10. Reading Kidney’s mind is no easy task, but we suspect that Johnny Sexton hasn’t yet earned the out-half slot for the likes of Australia or South Africa. Right or wrong, Kidney is more than entitled to make a call like this.

The same goes for his decision to make Eoin Reddan a contender for Tomás O’Leary’s shirt at nine. Peter Stringer, the brave battler that he is, just isn’t big enough for top-class international rugby. A casualty of the sheer size of rugby players today, Stringer would have been the best scrum half in the world if he had been playing in the ’70s or ’80s.

Reddan has served his penance for suggesting that someone else other than Kidney would make a good Irish coach, back when the job was up for grabs. He is back in Ireland and playing well in tandem with Johnny Sexton – a fact that shouldn’t be forgotten.
Is there a GAA manager to compare with Declan Kidney? Maybe Brian Cody in terms of understated efficiency. But Deccy swims in a bigger pond than Brian Cody. Like Cody he carries it off without offending anyone in public, without courting publicity or controversy, without causing problems for his employers, staff or his players. And he wins things!

These next three weeks will see his reputation further enhanced.

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