Gordon D’Arcy was speaking on behalf of Land Rover at Old Belvedere RFC where Land Rover and the Rugby World Cup 2015 Defender brought the Webb Ellis Cup as part of the 100 Day Tour of the UK and Ireland. Land Rover’s #WeDealInReal Rugby World Cup 2015 campaign will champion rugby’s grassroots by putting local clubs on the global stage. Follow @LandRoverRugby.
Youngsters were able to view the Webb Ellis Cup first hand and enjoy a training session with two Leinster stars Gordon D’Arcy & Isa Nacewa.
Next up for InTouch was literally a living Irish rugby legend Gordon D’Arcy! He said…… The kids are looking at the top level of things the offloading game and its coming through, they have much more access through streaming, videos, workshops etc to players and we are seeing the skills developing all the time, I actually see little kids doing it,
Reflecting on this years Six Nations Gordon commented,
The Six Nations rewards attack in each game both teams want to attack! People talk about rugby in one dimensional way, sometimes thinking of it as two defensive teams, and you can also have two different game plans and yes you can cancel it out but on that last day Scotland who have good players out wide meant Ireland knew they had to score tries and it added up to the finale you could not ask for what happened there! If you watched you would have to think it was Southern Hemisphere, instead of punishing lads for being expansive, coaches are encouraging creativity and having a go, in the past you would get criticised, today skills are excelling and as players with eyes firmly fixed on the World Cup any team who wants to progress really has to win their group!
You need to be able to have a squad and that strength and depth that Southern Hemisphere has means bigger squads, we are closing the gap in squads, our 31 has to be a lot stronger, in Ireland there is huge competition between the absolutely top top players there is not a huge variance but those variances are critically important in closing gaps so much!
This morning we were coaching, getting the ball in hand, on keeping score, and getting the ball to space, and that is what Landrover are doing by getting us involved, i was coached by david campese and i got some info from him, I tried everything he said to me, i remember hin saying be able tkick off two feet so i worked on that, its about the kids they are grassroots, we were those kids years ago, for them to see the trophy and to think I could be one of those people!
WOW what a chat, thank you Gordon D’Arcy!