Ireland dominated the skies against Australia on Saturday, and if they're to claim a big win against the world champions South Africa in Dublin this weekend, they will need a repeat performance.
Andy Farrell’s side owned the kicking game in their 46-19 win versus the Wallabies, with a total of 45 kicks from hand; a variety of box-kicks, crossfield kicks, touchfinders and grubbers in behind the defence.
It was their high, contestable kicks where Ireland really yielded dividend, winning a total of 10 back on their side, an impressive return from both the kickers and kick-chasers, who were working in-sync across the 80 minutes.
Mack Hansen, James Lowe and Tommy O’Brien all showed off impressive fielding, while their supporting cast were often on hand to sweep up any breadcrumbs that fell their way.
It’s an area of the game that has become even more crucial in the last 12 months after World Rugby clamped down on 'escorting’ by the receiving team; in essence creating a shield of players in front of a team-mate trying to catch a ball.
"It's something we've talked about massively in here," O’Brien says of their work around the kicking, and high fielding.
"Johnny's [Johnny Sexton] done a lot of work on it in terms of talking to past players, Rob Kearney, Andrew Trimble, Andrew Conway and then while he was down in Australia with the Lions I think he's done a lot of work with some of the AFL clubs to try and pick up as many little nuggets as he could.
"So, he's shared some of them with us and we're kind of just working on trying to implement them as much as we can.
"I would do a lot of it during the week. Obviously you're limited in the amount of practice you can do when you're playing lots of 80 minutes, you want to try and keep your legs fresh so definitely would do a lot of it, even just throwing balls up as well, not being as high impact on your legs and just kind of seeing the ball into your hands."
O’Brien (above) is expecting those skills to be further tested when the Springboks come to town on Saturday.
"We know they're obviously a very dangerous outfit, ranked number one in the world and obviously on great form at the moment.
"They kick a lot, I think they're averaging something like 36 kicks a game. So, it's probably something that we're expecting there to come after us early.
"So, a lot of work being done on that and then we just know that they're very good chasers. [Cheslin] Kolbe and [Kurt-Lee] Arendse are very good at chasing the box kicks. So that's something we're doing a lot of work around."
The 27-year-old had to be patient for his opportunity in Test rugby.
A former Ireland Under-20 captain, O’Brien’s progress at Leinster was constantly interrupted by injury before a clear run in the second half of last season saw him hit career-best form.
And after scoring four tries in his two summer caps against Georgia and Portugal, he’s started all three games this November, adding a try to his international tally versus Japan.
He thought he had scored again in last week’s win over the Wallabies, only for thee try to be ruled out due to a knock-on in the build-up.
But with five caps now under his belt, he feels he’s growing into Test rugby.
"I've loved and embraced any opportunity I've gotten. They were a step up, these November games, compared to the summer.
"I haven't felt out of place at all. I feel like it's where I belong. I feel like I can definitely contribute very well to the team.
"This is week four or week five in camp. So yeah, you definitely feel well used to it and well in with the guys. I haven't played too much internationally before but now I've played the last three 80 minutes, which is fantastic.
"They have been very different levels. We were disappointed with our performance in Chicago, but the great thing about that was that it was the first game and we knew we had three games.
"And obviously then Japan was better and then Australia another level up and we know it's going to have to be another step up again this week," he added.
Listen to the RTÉ Rugby podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
Watch Ireland v South Africa in the Quilter Nations Series on Saturday from 4.30pm on RTÉ2 and the RTÉ Player. Follow a live blog on the RTÉ News App and on rte.ie/sport. Listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1
