Simon Easterby has seen enough Six Nations upsets in his time to know that taking Wales lightly is a folly.
Back-to-back Ireland champions Ireland are overwhelming favourites to hand Warren Gatland's side a 15th consecutive defeat when the sides meet in Cardiff on 22 February.
Nobody is giving the hosts a chance, much as few gave England a chance at beating France, Ireland in last year’s championship, or going back to Easterby’s playing days, Ireland to beat Les Bleus that day in 2000 in Paris.
Ireland, two from two, will be focused and disciplined but Easterby, in interim charge with Andy Farrell on Lions duty, won’t underestimate Wales, who lost 22-15 to Italy in spilling rain on Saturday.
"It’s difficult," he said of Wales current situation. "There’s so much passion and support for their national team and at the moment they’re in a tough place.
"They weren’t particularly happy with the weather.
"Once they got behind, it was hard to play in those conditions. They certainly showed that, as the game went on, they got stronger and were able to get back into the game.
"They just didn’t have probably long enough to do that.
"We know that it’s a hell of a place to go and play, the roof will be closed, the atmosphere will be like it is every time we play in the Millennium Stadium against Wales, 75,000 passionate people that want and will their team to success.
"I’m a big believer in making sure that we play each game as it comes and that will be no different. We’ll enjoy this week, a bit of downtime, but we’ll make sure we’ll get prepared well for that Wales challenge."
The 49-year-old has used 25 players in the wins over England and Scotland and hopes Tadhg Furlong, Joe McCarthy and Mack Hansen will be fit for round three.
However, with France coming to Dublin in the penultimate round, Easterby admits he’ll have some figuring out to do around selection.
"No one wants to give up wearing the jersey, no one wants to give up the opportunity to play and perform. It’s a tricky one," he said.
"We’re very, very fortunate. We’ve lost a few players in the last couple of weeks, Mack on Thursday, but I don’t think there are many players that are going to be going, 'do you know what? I don’t fancy playing this next game’.
"Or the next one. It will be a balance.
"We’ve got to make sure we keep growing the group and growing experiences and hopefully that means some will get an opportunity but obviously some others won’t."
After much debate among fans and media about the out-half position, Easterby’s call to stick with Sam Prendergast paid off as he was named man of the match.
With Ireland holding a healthy lead in the final quarter, the coach sent on Jack Crowley (pictured above) at full-back with Hugo Keenan switching to the wing in place of try-scorer Calvin Nash.
"I think the game sort of changed a bit in that last 15, but I think it was just a bit of a chat with Goodie [Andrew Goodman] around getting a couple of first receivers on the pitch," he explained.
"It felt like we could play two-sided against them. Jack's first involvement was a great Garryowen take, a brilliant receive at the back.
"We felt like a bit of freshness was going to be important in that last 10 or 15 minutes, but they probably had more possession than we had in that period."
