IT WAS TOUGH to poke holes in Ireland’s status as the world’s number-one team coming into the World Cup, and then the lineout and scrum disintegrated.

There has been a major upturn in both set pieces since, particularly in the lineout where Ireland are running at 100% off their own ball across their two Six Nations games to date.

The man entrusted to fine-tune their lineout, however, insists that Ireland have made only subtle alterations since October.

Indeed, forwards coach Paul O’Connell seemed almost bashful when it was put to him that things had turned around.

Instead, the former Munster and Ireland lock was quick to pay credit to both World Cup pool opponents South Africa and quarter-final conquerors New Zealand for putting Ireland under pressure in the autumn, stopping well short of celebrating a blemishless record in this season’s Six Nations so far.

“Well, France having a red card for one of their second row helped, certainly,” O’Connell began. “[Paul] Willemse probably isn’t a big jumper for them but he’s certainly a big lifter and it would have upset how they would have defended.

“Italy haven’t challenged as much in the air in recent years as other teams. So, that’s part of it.

“We haven’t changed a massive amount,” O’Connell continued. “I’d say we’re doing what we do a little bit better, across the board; how we lift, how we jump, how we call, how we throw.

“In the World Cup — certainly in that South Africa game, they threw something different at us. We got our drill a little bit wrong and it led to a poor start to the game. Once we got over that, we were pretty much fine for the rest of the game.

“New Zealand got three lineouts off us in that game. Two, we got back straight away. One, we unfortunately high-tackled from and we ended up in our corner.

“They’re two very good defensive lineouts, those two teams that we played in the World Cup. And we learned a lot from those games.”

What were those lessons?

“One of the things was being able to manage a little bit of trouble and trying to get out of it,” O’Connell says. “And the other thing we learned from the World Cup [about the lineout] is it’s like every part of your game: it’s never just one thing.

“There’s ‘drill’ in it, there’s the call in it, there’s the thrower in it, there’s the selections you put on the menu first day — and I would say we’ve kind of improved a little bit in all of those regards without working on one particular thing.”

O’Connell equally qualifies the victory over France in Marseille as having been “tainted” by Willemse’s red card, albeit Ireland were already well in the ascendancy when the second row received his marching orders.

To the outside world, it was a historically great Ireland win. In the inside world, though, O’Connell is quick to point out how France might have defended not only the lineout but the maul differently if they had been at full complement.

To the former Munster lock, it was more a solid win than a spectacular one.

O’Connell is not surprised, however, that Ireland have been able to pick up in this championship where they left off just before the heartbreak of their World Cup quarter-final exit.

The void left by Johnny Sexton’s retirement was understandably a concern but it would appear that Ireland have navigated that process as seamlessly as would have been humanly possible.

“Johnny — there’s no point denying it — Johnny was a big part of how we play”, said O’Connell, “but he was a big part of how we prepare in the weeks as well.

“He was a big part of how we trained. He drove a very high standard because of the high standards he had himself, so to not have him in there in the week, in the build-up to a big game like that; in those two weeks to train well, to prepare well, and then go out and deliver on the day… I suppose it’s a good reflection on the leadership that has been built up over the last few years that we were able to [manage].

“It’s not going to be easy without Johnny,” O’Connell continued. “I’m sure there’ll be plenty of tough games but I think the leadership [group] did a great job. Obviously Jack Crowley did a great job at out-half as well.

“I think one thing that maybe Johnny has given a lot of the guys is he’s shown how much you have to care about the team, and how much you have to care about how you prepare, and how much you care about how the team feels Saturday, and he’s a great example to some of the guys who are going to end up as leaders in the team.

“So, while he’s gone, I think a bit of his legacy of how he used to go about his business still lives on with us. A lot of the guys — Peter O’Mahony, Caelan Doris, James Ryan, Iain Henderson, Garry Ringrose; a lot of these guys have his qualities in them that helps us to get to a good place every Saturday when we play.

“They don’t just think about themselves and big games, they think about the group and trying to get the team to feel good, feel prepared.

“That’s a big part of Johnny’s legacy as well.”