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Ireland assistant coach Mike Catt brushed off the suggestion that his side had sent a photographer to spy on their upcoming Rugby World Cup quarter-final opponents New Zealand. Catt was perplexed when asked about the prospect of ‘Spygate’ occurring in France during the captain’s run on Friday, forcing officials to get involved and explain the situation.
Having previously announced the Irish team that would take on the All Blacks on Saturday, Catt was then quizzed by a member of the New Zealand member over a photographer who had been affiliated with the Ireland team and attended their opposition’s training session on Thursday.
Catt was baffled and laughed when asked “Did you guys have a photographer at the All Blacks training session yesterday? If so is that something you’d normally do?” To which he replied: “I’m sorry, I wasn’t a part of that so…”
That was before the Ireland RFU press officer stepped in and insisted that the camp had been unaware of the photographer’s presence, but they would be within the rules to do so. “I don’t know. The agency could have been there working,” Peter Breen said.
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Then a World Cup official Greg Thomas stepped in to clarify the situation, confirming that the photographer was within their rights to attend the first 15 minutes of New Zealand’s training session. “The rules say yes, as long as they’re standing with the rest of the photographers, they can (attend training),” he said.
The 42 have claimed that it was a photographer from Inpho Photography in Ireland who had been in attendance during the short media vision access part of the training session at the INSEP sports complex, which is standard procedure at the World Cup – despite New Zealand’s potential frustration at their team being leaked prior to their announcement.
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Catt then went on to confirm that the Ireland team had a clean bill of health despite some injury concerns, especially to Mack Hansen, going into the quarter-final. “Yeah, everybody is fit,” Catt explained. “Mack (is) looking sprightly as ever. Yeah, he’s gone well. He is all good to run freely.”
Hansen picked up a calf injury and was forced off in the closing stages of Ireland’s win over Scotland, but took full part in training the following day and was named in Andy Farrell’s side to face New Zealand.
However, lock James Ryan and Robbie Henshaw were not able to play but Catt is hopeful that they can feature in the latter stages of the tournament should Ireland progress past the All Blacks.
“James is doing really well,” Catt added. “As you saw Robbie Henshaw and James were obviously out there at training this morning. They are progressing really nicely, so they will be available for next week.”
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