O'Driscoll has blind faith

By CHRIA RATTUE

Think of Irish rugby and you think of two men.

One is "blind as a bat". The other you just can't help seeing.

The first is Brian O'Driscoll, who rips through gaps on the field he can hardly see.

O'Driscoll is unable to wear contact lenses to correct his badly impaired vision. His father, a doctor, seriously believes his son takes on tiny gaps because they appear wider than they are.

The other iconic figure, of course, is the gleaming-headed hooker Keith Wood, who sees the game and what lies beyond extremely well.

If Ireland are to progress to their first World Cup semifinal, these two must shine against France under the Telstra Dome on Sunday night.

Not since Hugo Porta WAS Argentinian rugby - try naming another player from his era - have the fortunes and image of a team rested on so few shoulders.

Like Porta, the multi-skilled Wood WAS his team for so long, a shiny pin in the midst of a mob known for all rugby time as passionate but not triumphant.

Until along came O'Driscoll, who at 24 holds the Irish try scoring record and dazzles audiences with his skill in the centres.

"If you'd told me four years ago there would be someone bigger than Keith Wood in Irish rugby I'd have said never," says Irish Daily Star journalist Derek Foley.

Yet after one blazing performance in Paris, it was the image of O'Driscoll - draped with a flag and hoisted by Irish supporters - which filled every cover of his country's newspapers. When Wood rested injuries before this World Cup, no one flinched when O'Driscoll, the youngest member of the regular squad, was named captain.

His direction and inspiration were accepted. He did it again, against Australia last Saturday, taking the ball one handed and turning a tightrope to the tryline into a comfortable corridor.

O'Driscoll is also a ferocious trainer, and gifted and determined at many sports. As the legend goes, this Irish squad quit soccer at training not because O'Driscoll was too good, but because his all-out approach was a danger.

O'Driscoll has had to fight. He was so small as a kid that he missed his college junior team - the teacher/coach later feeling like "the man who turned down the Beatles".

And O'Driscoll has admitted to his own "tetchiness" in camp. The IRB ranked Ireland third going into the tournament, but O'Driscoll could sense his own determination and belief does not lie everywhere.

Ireland almost revels in tragic losses. Roy Keane, their hard-headed soccer captain, certainly thought so when he stormed out of the World Cup.

O'Driscoll, a Dublin northsider whose girlfriend Glenda Gilson is a famous Irish model, has taken rugby to new home audiences.

Wood though was the first man to give this Irish rugby generation hope.

Yet an Irish journalist dares suggest: "The difference between Brian and Woodie is that Brian is absolutely convinced Ireland can win the World Cup. He gets very upset when other people don't have the same conviction.

"Keith Wood knows Ireland can't win the World Cup but he's willing to talk a good game. It's the difference between a 30 and a 24-year old."

Munster-man Wood comes from, and is the heart of Irish rugby, although he has had spells with Harlequins.

Whether he returns for Munster is a life-and-death concern for the club's fanatical supporters, thousands of whom have regularly travelled on promising European Cup ventures often blighted by the bad luck of the Irish.

"Charlie, I actually nearly cursed you immediately. Refrain if you can," Wood told a persistent Munster scribe this week, when asked yet again about the future.

Wood, assured as a leader in rugby and life and always planning, is set for a business career after his final World Cup.

"I won't be here in four years' time," he says. "We don't want another four years of, 'God, if only'."

But Wood hints at the Irish undercurrent.

"If for one minute some of the players have the view we can't win it [against France], then it becomes quite a struggle."

Wood knows one Irish player, a certain Brian O'Driscoll, will take no convincing. For O'Driscoll, there is no, 'if only'.

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