Scott Bemand wants to bring growing support on his side’s journey
Having seen his side attract a record crowd for a standalone Women’s Six Nations game on these shores last weekend, Ireland head coach Scott Bemand is hoping for another big atmosphere when Wales pay a visit to Cork’s Virgin Media Park tomorrow week (April 13).
Surpassing the previous tally of 6,113 that was set when they faced the Welsh in the same venue two years earlier, Ireland’s Easter Sunday clash with Italy at the RDS saw 6,605 spectators passing through the turnstiles.
While the hosts ultimately fell short to Giovanni Raineri’s Italian outfit, Bemand is encouraged by the fact there is growing support amongst the general public for his charges.
He was still employed as England’s lead coach when 5,309 followers descended upon Virgin Media Park for their fourth round win over Ireland in last year’s Championship and with the Leeside venue’s official capacity stands at 8,008, tomorrow week’s game could go close to matching the new record attendance.
“We want to take people along with us. We want to give people something to shout about. I know we didn’t get the result we wanted last weekend, but in terms of performance and the game having moments in it that could really let an Irish crowd get behind their team, we’d love to see it again,” Bemand remarked in a video call yesterday.
“We’d love to see a full, packed out stadium. We want to see noise, we want to see flags, we want atmosphere. It’s something we’re really conscious of, taking it around the country. Hopefully we can put on another show and get a real bit of noise behind us.”
Despite losing out to France and Italy in the opening two rounds of this year’s Six Nations, Bemand remains in a relatively upbeat mood ahead of their meeting with Wales – who have suffered consecutive losses of their own to Scotland and England thus far in the 2024 Championship.
“When you review a game, you generally look at stuff that you need to fix to get the best version of you out there, but you know where it’s going. We know what we’re going into in two weeks, we know the situation that we’re both in,” Bemand added.
“We talk about being an honest group and we talk about wanting to walk towards pressure, so we’ll enjoy this week getting it right. We’ll enjoy next week, attacking the build-up to Wales and we’ll enjoy inviting Wales over to our shores.”