Last season's Six Nations championship victory was achieved with just a fourth ever Grand Slam for Ireland.
While two of them may have come in the last five years, that doesn’t mean Ireland will get greedy, according to Andy Farrell and expectations must be tempered.
Going back-to-back for a Guinness Six Nations clean sweep is as difficult as it sounds, more so when you consider that France and England are the away trips.
Add to that the natural risk that the World Cup hangover spills into the competition and beating all comers two years in a row sounds like a big stretch.
"We all know that winning a Six Nations is very hard to do because of the standard of the teams what we’ve got in the competition continues to grow and that’s why we all love it," said Farrell at the tournament launch in Dublin yesterday.
"What does success look like? We want to win every game and winning matters. I’ve never been one from shying away from that. I’ll say the same.
"But we’re realists and we know that it’s difficult."
Ireland open their campaign away to France before home games against Italy and Wales. England await in Twickenham and the final round sees Scotland come to the Aviva Stadium.
Farrell added: "I suppose every team in the competition would love to be in with a shout on the last weekend to be able to go on and win that.
"Obviously, there’s a lot of water that gets put under the bridge.
"You’ve got to roll with the punches especially in the Six Nations because it changes the whole time and that’s why we love it.
"It’s about getting ourselves to be in with a shout, however that may look on the final weekend. That has to be what we’re aiming for."
Farrell and Peter O’Mahony (above) faced the media for the first time since the Munster flanker was named as the new captain.
Earlier in the day O'Mahony told RTÉ Sport that he gave genuine consideration to calling time on his Ireland career after the World Cup before deciding not to make any rash decisions.
Farrell said while he speaks to the players regularly, he didn’t have to plead with the 34-year-old to stay on.
"I always speak to players, no matter what," said the 48-year-old.
"To me, it's the same as anything. It's about how you're performing and how you’re playing.
"Certainly, whether your form warrants getting selected and whether your body can do that.
"I think those type of decisions as far as that's concerned becomes pretty obvious if you're allow what's pretty natural to happen, 'I didn't have to persuade him, no."
