Rugby: Rugby-Ireland look to bury World Cup jinx in crunch All Blacks clash

PARIS (Reuters) – Form clashes with pedigree when Ireland look to bury their World Cup jinx forever against New Zealand at the Stade de France on Saturday in one of the most eagerly anticipated World Cup quarter-finals for many years.

Six Nations champions Ireland have already beaten defending champions South Africa in the pool stage and are riding a 17-match winning streak but know all that will count for nothing if they cannot get past the All Blacks.

No Ireland team has ever won a knockout match at the World Cup and ending that lamentable record to set up a semi-final against Wales or Argentina is the only thing Andy Farrell’s team are interested in this week.

“Ireland hasn’t been past these sort of stages so that’s obviously a big motivation,” said number eight Caelan Doris.

“We said at the start of the competition, we want to go the whole way. We think we have the squad to do it.”

Perennial title contenders New Zealand, by contrast, have only once failed to get as far as the semi-finals and lifted the Webb Ellis Cup in 1987, 2011 and 2015.

This All Blacks team has not enjoyed the dominance of their predecessors, however, and they suffered a home test series loss to the Irish last year before going down to hosts France in the tournament opener, their first ever pool-phase defeat.

A record 35-7 loss to the Springboks in their final warm-up match also increased jitters back home which their subsequent pool phase drubbings of Namibia, Italy and Uruguay have failed to fully settle.

Having kept Ireland winless for more than a century up until 2016, the All Blacks have lost five of the last eight meetings between the teams.

Coach Ian Foster will, though, be able put out his best team for the first time since sweeping the Rugby Championship, with the notable exception of winger Mark Telea who has been stood down for disciplinary reasons.

The triple playmaking option of Richie Mo’unga and Barrett brothers Jordie and Beauden produced some breathtaking rugby in the big pool-phase wins, while Will Jordan, Rieko Ioane and the powerful Leicester Fainga’anuku are world class finishers.

It is, however, the pack led by totemic number eight Ardie Savea who will need to match the accuracy and discipline under pressure of the Irish if New Zealand are to progress.

“It’s a final for us and there’s no second chance,” Savea said. “Whatever that looks like for us, we are just going to go out there and jam and play some footy.”

Ireland have proved themselves to be the complete package over the last year on the back of rock solid defence marshalled by the indefatigable loose forward trio of Doris, Josh van der Flier and Peter O’Mahony.

The backline led by 38-year-old flyhalf Johnny Sexton has proved clinical in taking its taking scoring chances through Bundee Aki and Garry Ringrose in midfield or James Lowe and Mack Hansen on the outside.

New Zealand thrashed the Irish 46-14 at the same stage of the 2019 World Cup but only five of the starting Ireland team from that match will be on the field come kickoff on Saturday.

“It’s a completely new squad, our mindset is different,” hooker Dan Sheehan said on Friday.

“I have no experience of earlier squads. You treat it like another game. It’s knockout rugby.”

(Reporting by Nick Mulvenney, editing by Toby Davis)