THE EQUALIZER
Nucifora proud of his role increasing Ireland’s depth across the four provinces
‘People are envious of our system’
THE landscape of Irish rugby has changed dramatically since the arrival of David Nucifora to these shores in April 2014.
The Australian had been appointed the IRFU’s first highperformance director less than a year after Joe Schmidt’s appointment as Ireland head coach.
Nucifora has not been afraid to make hard calls and shake up the established order of things within the Irish system.
Everything is geared towards the health of the national team these days. There have been some tough discussions and his relationship with the provinces has been strained at times, but it is hard to argue with the results during that time.
After Ireland’s last World Cup campaign fell apart when Schmidt lost four key players in the buildup to the quarter-final meeting with Argentina, Nucifora insisted that the player pool must be widened, by any means necessary. The net result has seen the likes of Jordi Murphy, Joey Carbery and Jack McGrath move to rival provinces. The establishment of IQ Rugby, to identify Irish-qualified talent abroad, has seen Will Addison, Mike Haley and Billy Burns brought on board. Then there is the controversial project player system that has seen Bun
dee Aki and Quinn Roux capped for Ireland, with Jamison GibsonPark, Jean Kleyn and James Lowe set to follow suit.
Say what you like about some of Nucifora’s dealings, but Schmidt is set to assemble the strongest Ireland squad to ever compete at a World Cup.
That tournament in Japan will be Schmidt’s final assignment before he heads for the exit door, but Nucifora is staying put. Earlier this week, it was announced that the 57-year-old had signed a three-year contract extension, taking him into the end of the 2022 campaign.
Yesterday he sat down for his annual meeting with the Irish assembled media and there was plenty to discuss.
There has been much talk about the increasing number of players moving to rival provinces to increase their chances of Test exposure.
Bill Johnston, a promising 22-year-old out-half from Munster’s academy, will be plying his trade at Ulster next season. It is a policy that has worked well in New Zealand with players constantly moving between the five franchises, but there is a concern that Munster — a club that thrives on its sense of local identity — is slowly being corroded. Ulster have made great strides under Dan McFarland’s stewardship but there is an argument that only four locals would feature in his first-choice starting line-up.
‘I don’t see it as an issue,’ says Nucifora.
‘People talk about will players moving to other provinces take away from the identity or the provincialism? I don’t think so. I remember sitting here a few weeks back watching Leinster and Ulster (in the European Champions Cup quarter-final). I thought, “bloody hell, what a fierce game”. They were ripping into each other, so the games don’t tell me that. The crowds, it was full here, full at the RDS on the weekend, it doesn’t seem to be making any difference in those particular areas.
‘At the end of the day, we’ve got to keep making sure that we get our best players out there and our best players playing and that’s how we get better.
‘Look, no-one says any system is perfect but there’s enough people around the world looking at our system and are envious.
‘We don’t think that it’s perfect and we’ve got to keep trying to make it better but we think we should be reasonably satisfied that we have a solid system here that we can make work quite well.’
Nucifora was quick to praise the contributions of McFarland and Andy Friend over the past year, who have drastically revived the fortunes of Ulster and Connacht during their first seasons in charge.
Leinster remain the standard bearers on this island while Munster, he admits, ‘are searching to get to that next level’.
Nucifora speaks about ‘the quality of coaching the teams have at their disposal’.
That brings us to the recent upheaval at Munster following the shock announcement that Jerry Flannery and Felix Jones, the respective forwards and backs coaches, had turned down contract extensions and would be leaving in the summer.
‘You don’t want to lose coaches out of the system, particularly young Irish coaches, but I don’t know if they’ll be lost,’ says Nucifora. ‘They may leave the system for a while but you’d be hopeful that they’ll reemerge somewhere over time.
‘Just because someone leaves somewhere, it doesn’t mean their careers are finished. We’d like to think that we can keep working with them somehow and see what fits with them and we keep developing them and they come back into the system at some point.’
Nucifora is ‘absolutely’ certain that Johann van Graan remains the right man to take Munster through yet another off-season of instability. The South African will spend the summer trying to rebuild his backroom team, with Rob Howley, Stephen Larkham and Graham Rowntree all linked to the vacant posts in recent weeks.
‘The head coach takes the brunt of everything all the time but he’s got a team of players and he’s got a team of coaches,’ he says. ‘It’s important that the team of coaches gel and work well together.’
In October 2018, the IRFU launched its latest strategic plan, with Nucifora citing World Cup semi-final appearances in 2019 and 2023 as ‘minimum benchmarks’ in that report.
Whether Ireland break that glass ceiling in Japan later this year remains to be seen. A disappointing Six Nations campaign has dampened expectations which went through the roof following last November’s victory over the All Blacks. After six years at the helm, it will be Schmidt’s last stand.
‘I don’t have to talk to yourselves about Joe, his record speaks for itself,’ Nucifora adds.
‘I think that Joe is in Joe mode at the moment. He is so focused for this World Cup and the preparation that they’re about to go into. There’s no other thought in the minds of those coaches other than what’s in front of them.’
Nucifora, meanwhile, will continue to do the hard work behind the scenes.