Sunday 15 March 2015 18:03, UK
Sky Sports columnist Jonathan Davies talks about the atmosphere in the Welsh training camp ahead of their vital clash with Ireland on Saturday.
It’s been a good week for me so far. I spent Wednesday at the races. Someone we chatted to after a Wales game said he’d get a helicopter to take us to Cheltenham and to his credit he delivered. We were taken in by chopper straight into the festival - there wasn’t much traffic so it was an easy ride in!
I felt like a bit of a rock star getting out of the helicopter and once we were dropped off, one of the first people I saw was Paul Scholes, so I got a quick photo with him. I felt bad asking him because he was just there to enjoy his day, but I couldn’t let the chance pass. Luckily, he was OK with it so I got in there and out quickly and left him to it.
There wasn’t any bickering, but there were plenty of frank conversations every time there needed to be. It was really great to see and even better to be a part of.
I did not have quite as much luck with the horses unfortunately, but what I’m hoping is that I’ve used up all my bad luck ahead of this weekend's game against the Irish!
This is going to be a massive game for us and for them, and to say I’m looking forward to it would be an understatement. We have to win in order to stay in the competition so it’s like a semi-final for us and the importance of the game isn’t lost on the boys.
At training on Tuesday, there was a really good edge. You could just tell at practice that the guys were not accepting anything but the best from themselves and from the rest of the team. There wasn’t any bickering, but there were plenty of frank conversations every time there needed to be. It was really great to see and even better to be a part of. Hopefully we finish off the week with a few good sessions and go into the game with Ireland with that exact same edge.
There isn’t a better team to face in this competition right now. Ireland have won their last 10 games, they’re third in the world and Joe Schmidt has an incredible reputation as a coach - and rightly so. There has been a lot of talk around the Gatland v Schmidt battle as the two Kiwi coaches come head to head.
Of course, we respect what Joe Schmidt has done with the Irish but we are pretty happy with our own New Zealander in Cardiff. Warren Gatland has been with the Wales team for some time now and has results of his own to show for it, so it’s a very good clash of intellect shaping up between two talented coaches. Our job as players is to make sure that Gats comes out on top at the end of the weekend.
I’m looking forward to my own match-up on Saturday. The Ireland midfield pairing is slightly new in terms of playing together but as individuals they have already proven themselves as brilliant players. The amount they’ve achieved in such a short space of time is a testament to what they can do and it will be an enormous challenge in Cardiff.
One of the biggest challenges with forming a partnership is figuring out how the other person likes to play, and moulding your game to bring the best out of them. Sometimes you get talented individuals but they don’t play well together, but that’s clearly not the case with the two Irish centres.
Games don’t come much harder than this and neither do the individual showdowns. But as I’ve said before as a sportsman you want to test yourself against the best every time you play, so I’m very excited about this weekend’s game.
See you all in Cardiff!
