As Jaco Peyper called time on a dark day for Welsh rugby, many in red sat back on their haunches.
Taine Basham, the lone standout in a desperate losing cause, fell to a single knee - spent at battling against the green tide for 80 minutes.
The defeated captain, Dan Biggar, wandered onto the field, exchanging pleasantries with Irish bodies until he reached Peyper.
Having shook his hand as he departed the pitch some 10 or so minutes earlier, there were more niceties as Biggar slipped back into captaincy mode.
The point he was making was, at this stage, redundant in terms of the one-sided scoreboard - but on principle alone, was well worth making again.
"Thanks for your efforts," said Biggar, before reiterating the source of his frustration throughout the 80 minutes.
"It's just the rolling away ones. I'm trying to make as much effort as I can when the ball is available."
"I appreciate that," was the official's solitary response. In fairness, the Welsh fly-half was never going to get the answers he sought on the sideline of the Aviva Stadium pitch.
Beaten, he warmly thanked Peyper again and moved on.
To call Peyper's officiating loose might be a little bit of an understatement.
In a first-half where Wales didn't win a single penalty, the referee could be heard time and time again telling players from both sides, "I hear what you're saying, but I played on".
You'd be hard-pressed to point the finger of blame at him, however sorry a result this was.
But that's not to say that Wales didn't endure their frustrations with the officials.
After a fairly obvious Jamison Gibson-Park knock-on was missed by officials, one Welsh voice rang out over the bone-crunching thuds of phase play with his own interpretation of events.
"F**king hell!"
The entire Welsh front-row also each had their own complaints about the scrum at one point or another, while Liam Williams seemed more than a little weary when making certain points to Peyper.
One particular exchange around the scrum brought a smile to the official's face. After Wyn Jones protested his innocence, claiming "I'm good to go, then he goes down", Irish tight-head Tadhg Furlong hit back with the retort of 'I'm going forward, so it must be you".
A little laugh was all Peyper allowed himself to let out.
As Biggar walked alongside Peyper down the tunnel at half-time, the fly-half was, to his credit, making his point in a manner befitting a Test captain.
"Is it possible to look at the tacklers?" queried Biggar. "They're lying in the way and slowing ball?"
"Just keep that tackle area clean," he reiterated.
If he was cordial with the officials, he was more than ready to read the riot act to his team-mates when needed.
"Bit more about us, boys," he screamed at one point. "Bit more about us.
"F**k me, where's the urgency. We're a team here, boys."
When Andrew Conway stretched over in the corner, Biggar could be seen pointing furiously at where Johnny McNicholl should have blitzed - with the winger reading the play wrong and biting in to leave his opposite number with try-scoring opportunity.
For all the riot acts that were read and the diplomatic work that Biggar was trying to do, there was still the sense that, while it was 10-0, Wales believed there was some chance of a turnaround.
And then that belief was gone.
Just on the brink of being awarded their first penalty, Josh Adams hit Johnny Sexton with a reckless hit off the ball.
"Oh f**k off," responded the Wales centre as Irish jerseys flooded around him to complain.
"Play it real speed," asked Peyper to the TMO as he decided there was a case to answer. "Don't slow it down."
While Peyper was distracted by the replays on the big screen, the players - like schoolkids once the teacher's back is turned - started to come together and pipe up.
Sexton tried to get to Adams to give him a piece of his mind, while Conway also pointed a judgemental finger or two in the direction of the Welshman.
However, once the inevitable happened and Adams was shown yellow, it seemed Wales knew it was curtains.
You sensed Biggar knew that. After yet another penalty went Ireland's way, words to the effect of "we can't win" were uttered by the Welsh skipper.
"I understand, Dan," was the only reply he got back.
Speaking afterwards whether he felt he got through to Peyper, Biggar drily said: "You will have to ask him that, won't you. It is not for me to answer that."
But the sinking realisation had set in.
By the time Basham crossed for a late score to wipe the zero off the scoreboard, few Welsh players congregated around the young Dragon to celebrate.
Most were already back in their own half, still a little dumbstruck by what had happened.
In breaks of play, some players just stood there - starting into the distance as they likely contemplated quite how it had come to this.
In truth, the writing's been on the wall for some time.
It's no secret that Welsh rugby cannot live on credit alone.
The Welsh Rugby Union's mismanagement, the lack of backing of the regions, the muddled pathway and the sobering reality served up by Wales' U20s own Irish humiliation in Cork are more than enough warning signs that soon the success will dry up.
It's not enough to hope that Wales' players simply defy the odds once again and become the exception to the rule.
Perhaps, as some in red stared beyond the green Dublin turf and through the travelling supporters, they realised that too.
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