Tony Ward believes that Ireland's barren season is the wake-up call they need prior to next season's World Cup in The Irish Independent.
"From trophy-laden heroes to empty-cabinet zeros. Having swept the boards in a 2009 winning feast, taking the Grand Slam, Six Nations, Triple Crown, Heineken Cup, Magners League and Churchill Cup, 2010 has made for the inevitable hangover -- the famine after the feast.
"Realistically, could it ever have been any other way? Inevitably, when you win everything the only way is down. It took little by way of rocket science to predict that last year's sweep would be a difficult act to follow.
"For such a relatively small but sports-daft nation, we set ourselves some sky high standards. That, as Keith Wood, Roy Keane, Brian O'Driscoll and others of that ilk will tell you, is no bad thing. We do need to set our standards high, but they must be grounded in reality."
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