This was powerful stuff.
Joe Schmidt is a master of the press conference. He has sat through enough of them at this stage to be able to get his message across, plant the odd seed, praise the opposition and, when that is done, chew the clock up.
The Ireland coach was in a similar vein of form at this afternoon’s press conference at Carton House.
Moments after naming his Ireland team to face Italy, Schmidt had offered up his team selection reasons, placated us on Joey Carbery not starting and had managed to keep most of his squad happy while name-dropping several of the Italian stars too.
He simultaneously talked Jordan Larmour [named on the bench] up while not giving away where he could feature against the Azzurri and managed to squeeze in some nice words about match referee Romain Poite. Job(s) done.
It was the final question of the Ireland presser, though, that gave Schmidt pause for thought before he opened up on a player, and man, he fondly regards – Jared Payne.
The pair have worked together since August 2014, with Payne making his debut three months later in November’s Guinness Series. Payne was Ireland’s defence captain for three years, when fit, but he has not played since suffering migraine problems on the 2017 Lions Tour to New Zealand.
Payne has taken up coaching responsibilities [defence] up at Ulster Rugby since the recent departure of Les Kiss from the director of rugby role.
Asked if he was pleased to hear of some positive news for Payne, Schmidt spoke extremely well but also refused to give up on the centre ever playing again. He said:
“Jared might not be finished playing the game yet.
“I’ve had discussions with Jared, they’re ongoing, and we’ll continue to have those discussions. He’s in great shape so I wouldn’t rule him out.
“He’s got a real understanding of the game so to have him involved in coaching and to have that experience that he brought to our team, I think you only have to ask the players how comfortable he made other players feel because he understood the game. That’s got to be good.”
With that, the live section of the press briefing was done.
It was a powerful moment and a human moment. It is clear that Schmidt thinks a lot of the 32-year-old. It was a brief glimpse of the human side of this game before we got back to business.
Schmidt made a joke with Conor Murray, who had only fielded one question and who was not required for the next interview session with the journalists from daily publications. He then took a deep breath and readied himself for another media masterclass.
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