Greg Feek and John Plumtree were once embedded in the Irish system and, although the latter’s stint in the country was much shorter, both coaches have a deep knowledge of how we do things here.

Feek ended his successful nine-year stint in Ireland following the disappointing 2019 World Cup exit at the hands of the team he left for.

The former All Blacks prop played a central role in transforming the Ireland scrum into the force it is today, particularly in the work he did with the likes of Tadhg Furlong, firstly at Leinster, where he was scrum coach for four years, before Joe Schmidt took Feek with him to the international set-up.

Feek was involved in the decision-making process around Andrew Porter switching to tighthead, with the All Blacks scrum guru now tasked with exploiting his former protege’s lack of international game-time at loosehead.

Schmidt was also the man who brought Plumtree, like Feek, to Ireland, but he didn’t last long as he returned home to become the Hurricanes’ assistant coach.

Since his exit in 2014, Plumtree has worked his way up the New Zealand ranks via a two-year stint with Japan. And he now finds himself part of Ian Foster’s backroom team, along with Feek. 

Plumtree is a well-regarded forwards coach and has helped the All Blacks rediscover their edge up front.

He is getting the best out of Ardie Savea and Brodie Retallick while helping younger players such as Hoskins Sotutu and Dalton Papalii fulfil their potential.

Between Feek’s work around the scrum and Plumtree drilling the forwards, O’Connell will have his work cut out to not only withstand the inevitable barrage of pressure that will come Ireland’s way on Saturday afternoon, but also to throw something different at the All Blacks.

“He’s really fussy about how he goes about his business,” Plumtree said of O’Connell in 2014.

“He doesn’t do all the bantering and yelling off the pitch, he gets on with it. He’s a smart operator; he knows the right questions to ask and what buttons to press, and he’s a good man.”

Many of those same traits apply to Paul O’Connell the coach, as his influence has been vital since joining Andy Farrell’s staff earlier this year.

It’s not only the lineout that has improved significantly, Ireland’s work around the breakdown has also been enhanced by the Limerick man’s ‘fussy’ attention to detail.

“I think you don’t get a lot of time with the players, you need to be pretty clear in what you want them to do,” O’Connell said of the biggest challenge since taking on the job as Ireland’s forwards coach. “You need to keep delivering that. I suppose, we change little bits from time to time but players can’t keep hearing different messages.

“They need to have the same messages thrown at them and said in the right way.

“That’s the big thing for us, you get so little time to package it as best as we possibly can for the players, so that when they do come in to us they are able to pick it up really quickly.

“Set-piece, it doesn’t matter where you go, it’s such an important part of the game for us.

“Kick-offs, scrums, lineouts. You can be very, very comfortable, competent on your own ball and put the opposition under pressure in those parts of the game, then you can deny the opposition access and give your own team access.

“It doesn’t matter what level you’re playing at. Again, trying to make sure our ball-winning is good; our scrum, lineout, restart.

“Trying to figure out ways to do that, that takes as little time as possible during the week, so we can work on other things as well.

“Certainly, when I first came into the Irish team the balance of how we trained in terms of set-piece was far too much set-piece and not enough of the other stuff.

“You’re trying to make sure you look after that really important part of the game in as little time as possible so that you can keep the players fresh and work on other things.

“The big thing is the time challenge. Club coaching is tough, there are so many games in the year. International rugby, there aren’t enough games.

“You’d love something smack bang in the middle, to allow you to put your head up and look around at what’s going on in the world and see if there’s anything to copy, paste and edit as we do.

“You’d love to be in the grind a little bit more and building. That’s the challenge.”

Having also been involved in club and international coaching, Feek and Plumtree would likely echo a lot of O’Connell’s sentiments.

When the ex-Ireland captain speaks about keeping a close eye on what other teams around the world are doing, the All Blacks are certainly front and centre of that.

Feek and Plumtree will be able to provide the inside track on Ireland this week, even though the set-up has changed since their time here.

However, O’Connell will also have studied the All Blacks from a long way out, including how his former coaches have looked to implement their philosophies. 

It all makes for another fascinating subplot to an enthralling contest.