And the former world record points scorer, who played for Wales at the 1991, 1995 and 1999 World Cups, admitted the Class of 2015 are “100%” ahead where the Welsh teams of the past were in their build-up to the game’s biggest tournament.
“The boys have been working incredibly hard over the last six weeks – it has been tough and brutal. To see them train and get through the workload they have been given has been pretty incredible,” said the Wales assistant coach.
“I would like to think they are in pretty good nick at the moment and we are still just under seven weeks away from the opening World Cup game. They are only going to get fitter as they keep putting in the sessions.
“If you see it at first-hand you do question whether it’s really all necessary, but it is to win a World Cup. It gets to a point where they are training that hard you wonder is someone going to drop out.
“But they keep going, keep on encouraging each other and keep dragging each other across the line. I’ve nothing but praise for them and, in fact, I’m in awe of them.
“We need to be in the best possible shape to give ourselves a chance to get out of our group. We know what we are up against with two world-class sides in Australia and England, and Fiji and Uruguay are no mugs.
“If we hadn’t been in such good shape four years ago we might not have got out of our group and it certainly helped when we were playing Samoa in what was a brutal game. It put us in good stead for the tournament.”
Wales launch their World Cup warm-up campaign against Ireland at a sold-out Millennium Stadium on Saturday with all the ‘fringe players’ in the squad likely to get a chance to impress before head coach Warren Gatland cuts his numbers by up to 10 players next week.
That is going to add extra pressure to the team that dons the new World Cup jersey for the first time, but Jenkins admits there can be no letting up in intensity given the Pool in which Wales have found themselves at the tournament.
“It’s the hardest Pool in the competition. I’m not too sure what the world rankings might be at the time, but it could be three four and five all in the same group,” said Jenkins.
“These games can go either way, but we just have to be positive. We backed ourselves four years ago, we did pretty well and we’ve been successful in between the two World Cups.
“We got plenty of good players on the British & Irish Lions tour, we’ve won at Twickenham and come ridiculously close to beating Australia on a number of occasions. But England have beaten us at Cardiff as well.
“That’s why we are looking forward to Saturday and getting these games up and running and seeing where we stand. We have a strong squad and, whatever team takes the pitch against Ireland,it will be a strong one.
“Winning is important and whenever you put on that Welsh jersey you want to win. Saturday will be no different – it’s a Test match and we are at home against a very good rugby nation.”
