Blindfolded training and his mindset: Kieran Read shares insights with Leinster

If there were times during Kieran Read’s long and successful stint as All Blacks captain when they looked like they could win games with their eyes closed then it wasn’t always a million miles from the truth.

But more on that later.

Read was a sublime rugby player, a No.8 of rare vintage who offered power, skill and a potent brand of leadership to the Crusaders and to New Zealand in the course of a 15-year career. And he has brought all that experience to Leinster’s UCD training base this week.

The 36-year old has a number of personal connections with the province.

Among them are Stuart Lancaster who was linked with Crusaders before joining Leinster in 2016, assistant coach Andrew Goodman and tighthead Michael Ala’alatoa – both of whom came from the same Christchurch club - and even Jason Jenkins with whom he shared a dressing-room in Japan with Toyota Verblitz.

It’s six years since another Kiwi legend, Graham Henry, spent a chunk of the summer with Leinster as a consultant and famously declared that a young and promising Joey Carbery could be their first-choice out-half for the next decade.

Read’s visit is more fleeting - and highly unlikely to offer up a prediction of anything like equal import off the back of it - but the potential for learning on the part of the province’s players and coaches this week is still obvious.

“The lads were picking him up individually, but he talked at the team meeting at lunchtime and was great,” said head coach Leo Cullen. “Yeah, he was very good in terms of his sharing of his different experiences, particularly because we've got a young group this week. It was great to have him in.

“He was in the UK last week so he came over for the (Munster) game on Saturday and was around for the weekend. He met a few of the lads for lunch yesterday and I would have met him last night for a bite to eat and he was obviously in first thing this morning. He's been around all day.

“He's been great, very good, just in terms of mindset. He's one of the iconic figures of the game, really.” 

With the province’s Ireland contingent having already turned their attention to the November internationals, it fell to those outside that inner circle to pick Read’s brain. Among them was fellow back row Max Deegan who had been scrutinising the older man’s game for hints and tips when he was still a schoolboy.

“I think especially back then a lot of number eights were unbelievably physical, like [Pierre] Spies, whereas a No.8 I liked was Kieran Read, or even [Taulupe] Faletau, where they’re very skilful, their catch-pass is really good, good offload, good feet, and then obviously great ball-carriers.

“That’s kind of something I would look at in my game: the ability to catch-pass at the line, make good decisions, be a smarter rugby player than the opposition. I might not be as physical as some No.8s, say over in South Africa, but being a smarter one, being able to work smarter, pick my moments, things like that.” Like Read in the latter part of his career, Deegan has made a point of gravitating towards the middle of the field more in recent times, vacating the edges for more carries, more tackles and to make more of an impact in general.

He had no shortage of questions for a man he described as “the best No.8 in the world for almost ten years”, ranging from insights on what he did to improve himself outside of training, to how he fine-tuned his game to an extent that elevated him from a level of mere excellence to that of world-class.

“He would have worked a lot around the control of the ball at the scrum,” explained the Leinster forward. “He would have done little bits blindfolded. In the scrum you can’t always necessarily see everything, so he’d be able to feel where the ball is, to get in the right positions for the scrum-half.” 

Wait, he practised blindfolded?