Schmidt clarifies what happened to Sexton - who's doing 'quite well'
Joe Schmidt hopes Johnny Sexton will shake off a head injury in time for Ireland’s Guinness Six Nations trip to Italy.
British and Irish Lions fly-half Sexton lasted just 24 minutes of Ireland’s fraught 22-13 victory over Scotland at Murrayfield on Saturday.
The 33-year-old failed a Head Injury Assessment (HIA) and Joey Carbery came on, stepping up to set Keith Earls free for the winning score as Ireland hit back from last weekend’s 32-20 defeat to England.
Head coach Schmidt later downplayed the extent of Sexton’s injury as he said: “Johnny failed an HIA, he just banged his head in the build-up to our second try, he just fell pretty heavily.
“He seems to be doing quite well now though, so we’re hopeful he’ll be okay for the next game (against Italy on February 24).
“He copped a stamp at one point; I don’t even think it was a Scottish foot, I think it was one of our guys who tripped over him.
“He got two knocks so they were cumulative, and he has a swollen ankle, but that’s just swelling and he should bounce back from that pretty quickly.”
Admitting Ireland expected Scotland to single out Sexton and attempt to shut him down physically, Schmidt insisted that worked to the visitors’ advantage.
Sexton’s cute inside ball sent Jacob Stockdale haring clear for Ireland’s second try, leaving Schmidt happy with another training-ground ruse come good.
Schmidt was phlegmatic on Scotland targeting Sexton, replying: “It was going to happen, and Johnny probably knew he was only going to play 20 minutes so tried to cram it all into one quarter!
“That pass release for Jacob’s try was perfect, the guy maybe could have got to Jacob if not for that intent in trying to get to Johnny. So sometimes that works to our advantage.
“We felt that if we got the ball into Peter O’Mahony’s hands they would think he was just going to carry round the corner.
“So for Johnny to come back and strike round that side of the ruck might be an option.
“Mostly we would strike on the other side of the ruck, so we thought it might be an opportunity. And there’s no better man to get it in his hands than Jacob.”
Conor Murray, Stockdale and Earls all crossed for Ireland, with Carbery shrugging off an intercept pass that led to Sam Johnson’s try to set up his Munster team-mate Earls for the winner.
Schmidt admitted Ireland fell flat in their build-up to their England defeat, but was pleased and relieved to report greater buoyancy and urgency in Edinburgh.
“There was definitely a rise in temperature, definitely a rise in energy, from last week,” said Schmidt.
“You’ve got to have a lot of energy when you make as many tackles as we did in the first half.
“Now we’ve got to make sure we kick on from here. We’re relying on other people now, but the one thing we don’t have to rely on other people for is how we approach things and how we perform.”
Gregor Townsend took responsibility for Scotland’s defeat, admitting his side’s attack slipped off in the second half.
“Just that final piece, the execution off set-piece, that fell off the jigsaw today, and that’s my fault,” said Townsend, who confirmed full-back Stuart Hogg suffered a shoulder injury.
“I’m the attack coach, and we weren’t able to get those two or three phases either to get in behind the defence or set up our set plays.”
Press Association Sports
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Interesting comments about Touch. England’s hosting the Touch World Cup this year and the numbers have exploded since their last World Cup in 2019, something like 70% more teams and 40 nations taking part. And England Touch have made a big thing about how many universities are in their BUCS University Touch Championship as well as Sport England membership. Can only see this growing even more domestically as more people become aware of it
10 Go to comments“Cortez Ratima is light years ahead of anyone on current form, while TJ Perenara has also skyrocketed into contention following the unfortunate injury to the talented Cam Roigard.” At last some sanity. Hitherto so many pundits have been wittering on about Finlay Christie to the point one wondered if they were observing a FC in a parallel universe where the FC they saw wasnt just the mediocre Shayne Philpott project of Fosters hapless AB reign in the real world. Ratima, Perenara and Fakatava are the ONLY logical 9s for Razor now Roigard is crocked.
2 Go to commentsThis game was just as painful as the Hurricanes game. It was real fork-in-the-eye stuff.
2 Go to commentsNow if they could just fire the Crusaders ground PA guy who likes to play his dance music and just loves the sound of his own voice the entire game, even when play is going on. And I thought their brass band thing of a few years ago was bad.
5 Go to commentsUnfortunately when you lose by far the two form players this season in Roigard and Aumua, you're left replacing two game changing Tanks with a couple of pea-shooters. Which is also about the speed of TJs pass.
2 Go to commentsBit rich coming from the guy with zero loyalty to anyone or any team, including happily taking a players place in a league world cup squad because well, SBW wanted to play in it and thus an already named player got told he was no longer going. And airing stuff like this, which may or may not be true, doesn't exactly say you're a stand up guy either SBW. Just looking to keep his name in lights as usual.
37 Go to commentsTamati Tua. …the Taniwha NPC midfielder. Ollie Sapsford, Hawkes Bay NPC midfielder…doing well
2 Go to commentsFiji deserve to be in the rugby championship, fans love seeing the Fijian national team play, the Fijian Drua is a wonderful idea but the players can still be stolen to play for NZ and AUS…
1 Go to commentsThe first concern for this afternoon are wheather forecast…
1 Go to commentsWhy cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to commentsBig difference from the Saders. Forwards really muscled up and laid a solid platform. Scooter brought some steel and I liked the loosie combination. Newell has been rather disappointing this season but stepped up big time - happy also to see Franks dot down. He should do that more often! Reihana had a good game and there seems to be more flair and invention with him in the saddle. McNicoll plays well from the back and is reliable plus inventive when he joins the line. Keep it up chaps!
5 Go to comments🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
33 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
4 Go to comments