Former Australian full-back and World Cup winner Chris Latham was once described as one of most exciting attackers in rugby – but now he believes Ireland hold the deadliest attack in world rugby.
Speaking while rain batters the window on a miserable Irish morning, Latham, soaking up the sun on the Queensland coast, seems to have the better location.
“Yeah, I’m cooking up a barbeque here in Brisbane in my back garden,” he smiles, “no top on, no shoes on, the evening sun on my back… yeah I’m doing good.”
Round one to the former Wallaby.
Despite having 78 caps to his name, three World Cups under his belt, a Lions series win and 40 tries scored – second only to the legendary David Campese – Latham remains a down-to-earth, friendly soul.
But one who still lives and breathes rugby, and has a new venture of his own on the horizon.
“It was great to be appointed the Chicago Hounds manager a couple of months back,” he says of his new role in America’s Major League Rugby.
“The job attracted me as it involves a buy-in into the entire rugby community in Chicago and the grassroots, not just the first-team squad.
“I feel that I can be a part of growing an entire project.”
By bringing in the likes of ex-Ireland International Dave Kearney to support the youth, Latham feels that lessons can be learned from the Irish provincial system.
“When you look at Munster, Leinster and even the Crusaders in New Zealand, they have invested so much in academies, complimented by international players who can set a standard for the youngsters to achieve.
“That’s what I want to do in the States, and I think we have a superb product that will hopefully grow from strength to strength over the coming couple of years.”
The Australian national side, however, has lost some of that grassroots focus in the last decade; long gone are the halcyon days when Latham and co feared no one.
In the late 1990s and early Noughties the Australians had a swagger that saw them resented in some quarters, but was wholly justified on the pitch.
Now, as they arrive on these shores to face Ireland in Saturday’s Autumn International – with former Irish boss Joe Schmidt charged with rejuvenating their fortunes - they languish towards the bottom end of the world’s top 10 sides.
That would have been unthinkable a decade ago.
“It has been a tough time for Australian rugby,” he says.
“When I was playing it would have been an absolute disaster if we were outside of the world’s top three sides, and now look at us. We can only enviously look at the likes of Ireland, but I can see that there are some green shoots emerging.
“Firstly, I think Joe Schmidt is the right man for the job. He can hopefully change the team’s mindset the way he did with Ireland.
“The last couple of months haven’t been great but I have seen a few times where that bite is back in defence, and I think to myself ‘there it is’, and that gives me and fans some optimism.”
Having talked so much about grassroots development, Latham acknowledges that at the highest end of the game sometimes it is just doing what you can to win, and the Australian Union have spent £2.5 million to achieve just that in another cross-code experiment.
The man who has given Rugby League defences nightmares up and down Australia is now firmly on Ireland’s dual-code coach Andy Farrell’s radar – enter, Joseph Suaalii.
Latham believes the winger has the potential to be a star, and worth the huge payday if he genuinely buys into the union project.
“Time will tell if he will be a success.
“He really is a freak of an athlete, very much in the physical mould of an Israel Folau, and if he picks up the nuances of the game he could be a huge success. But if he leaves after a year or two, what have we achieved?
“However, at the pinnacle of professional rugby sometimes you need to take a bit of a gamble and I think if you see little boys and girls wearing his name on their shirts and pretending to be him in their back gardens and at school, that can only be a good sign.”
The former full-back knows it will take more than one individual to down this Irish side, and speaks glowingly of the teams’ threats both in attack and defence, masterminded by coach Farrell.
“They are a bloody good team - I think the world is watching on wishing they had the same attack as the Irish.
“It is extremely clinical, efficient and highly effective, with their two-layer attack and threats from deep. On the other hand, their defence is extremely limiting and if you look at the stats you can see how effective they are in stopping teams from scoring even if they make it into their 22.
“Nowadays it’s not even about the individual. Back in my day if Brian [O’Driscoll] or Paul O’Connell were injured before a game, you thought that was a game changer, but now Ireland have a full squad of world class players who can step in.
“It reminds me of the depth we had back in the day, or that the All Blacks always seemed to have. I mean this in the nicest possible way, they have an arrogance about them and a self-belief that we need to find again.
“We will aim to win all the games on tour but this will certainly be our most difficult tie, I think they are two sides in different places but it should be an entertaining tie for sure.”
Latham has often been outspoken about the influence of cards during a game and feels that the new 20-minute red card rule is a sticking plaster to cover a much larger wound.
“Don’t get me wrong, I completely understand player safety and advocate that,” he says.
“But at a professional level, it is the contact that makes this game appealing. I think an accidental high shot shouldn’t be a red card as it totally depletes the game as a spectacle and if we keep sending people off it will severely limit rugby as a game for all.
“If tackles are reduced to such a low impact level, there will be no need for the prop as all the positions will be taken up by backs or back-rowers and I think that’s sad for our sport.”
