In sport the location of the thin line between genius and madness is often governed by the result. Win and you get to write the narrative, lose and the whole world gets to critique the defeat, armed with the certainty of hindsight.
In the build-up to last Saturday’s game at the Aviva Stadium, the talk was of France’s 7-1 forwards-to-backs split on the bench. Post-match the majority of column inches were taken up by Antoine Dupont’s unfortunate injury and the verbal pot shots aimed by French coach Fabien Galthié at several Ireland players.
For me, the work of France’s defence coach Shaun Edwards had a massive impact on the outcome. The way he set up the team in that facet of the game was nothing short of brilliant,…