IRELAND IAN HENDERSON believes that Ireland can cope without their captain Johnny Sexton and that his absence doesn't hamper the team in any way. Sexton missed Ireland's loss to France with a hamstring injury and was replaced by Munster's Joey Carbery.
Sexton has been around the block when it comes to rugby and even gone on two Lions tours. The Leinster man has also won world player of the year in 2018 and 102 caps for his country.
Henderson, who was twice used off the bench after injuries to James Ryan and Peter O'Mahony, Carbery would know the game as well as Sexton
Henderson speaking to the media said"
"We would train a lot of the week with Joey and Johnny and Jack [Carty] swapping quite regularly, so you're used to dealing with them and everyone is singing off the same hymn sheet,"
"The lads had full confidence going into that game. It didn't really cross my mind when I heard that Johnny wasn't playing and I was happy with Joey playing.
"He was calling the shots out there and when I'm calling lineouts I go to him and get the info and feed it back to the forwards. It feels comfortable.
"As classy as Johnny is when he's in there, when Joey steps up I don't feel like there's any deficit."
Photo By Brendan Moran/Sportsfile via Getty Images)The Ulsterman was also asked to reflect on what happened between the sides and the lock felt that Ireland's poor ability in the breakdown was the deciding factor.
"We had tried to identify a few things they did in previous games.
"They throw a lot of people into rucks, try to make it scrappy.
"Obviously, the way we like to play, we like to play probably a slightly tidier game in terms of the numbers in breakdowns.
"We probably fell into their traps a number of times putting too many in and that would leave us skinny in other places.
"Defensively as well, I haven't watched it back obviously, but they caught us a few times and we had a couple of switch-offs. But on the whole, I thought we came together quite well."
Ireland’s breakdown accuracy is no where near where it should be. France getting loads of joy out of the counter-ruck.
— Cian Tracey (@CianTracey1) February 12, 2022
