At the finish it wasn’t readily apparent who was at the end of yet another enervating season and who was not even at the halfway point. It can get like that when the margins are tight and the mind takes over. For Australia they were trying to get beyond break-even in their campaign, another brick in the defensive wall against the Lions next summer. Ireland were in similar statistical mode: two from four this month would not have been a good look. With the bean counters at their end-of-match positions, Ireland managed to avoid that.
In a week dominated by Andy Farrell picking a novice at No 10, it was fitting that another from the same age bracket nudged Ireland into the safe zone. The replacement hooker Gus McCarthy brought something extra to a game where it was badly needed. His late try off a maul put Ireland in credit. By then the other new kid on the block, Sam Prendergast, had played a hugely positive part in a game ruined by the time wasted to set scrums, and the number of handling errors that led to those scrums. Somewhere in between those two pitfalls was a game of rugby looking for some attention. So, far from perfect, but something positive for both sides to take away.
“I felt that at times in that first half we didn’t quite capitalise on the line breaks we made,” Joe Schmidt, the former Ireland coach, said. “We did get to the ball and we kept it but in the second half probably my one disappointment around the game was we got quite conservative. And when you do that against Ireland and you’re hanging on and you’ve got a four-point lead and you’re hoping that’s enough – I think we tried to do that from too far out. I don’t know what the territory and stats were but we were having to work very, very hard.”
If this is all about the Wallabies getting up to speed before next summer’s Lions tour, then the way their attack flowed was a huge positive, best illustrated by Max Jorgensen’s try in the first half. They dragged the home team from one side to the other expertly for the wing to finish with a bit of room to spare.
Their defence too was impressive, despite finishing 1-3 on the try count. Ireland’s attack shape is relentless, with some variations built in, but the gold shirts put the hammer on them.
“I was very proud of our defensive effort, especially in that second half when we kept showing up for each other,” the captain, Harry Wilson, said. “But they kept on coming.”
Yes, they did, but not always with ball in hand. The 21 handling errors by men in green was a handbrake pulled up more than released. So for Farrell the review will be painful, even if it secured three wins from four games this month. If tagged along with the New Zealand game, it will make for a heap of homework for Simon Easterby, who fills in now for Farrell until the end of next summer’s tour to Georgia and Portugal while the coach goes off to lead the Lions.
By half-time Ireland had backed themselves into a corner, squandering great attacking platforms off the lineout, where four throws were lost by the end of the day. They turned around 13-5 down, although it would have been just a point if Joe McCarthy had not been robbed – his own fault – under the crossbar. Along with Finlay Bealham, he has to wear a few howlers.
The good news for Ireland was Prendergast’s love of the environment: he is made for this. In the opening 10 minutes of the second half he was adding five points off the tee, with Caelan Doris’s try putting Ireland ahead. But Noah Lolesio hauled the Aussies back in front before the late charge off the bench got Ireland over the line. The relief was palpable against a side dismissed out of hand at the World Cup.
“I think supporters of the Lions can see enough of what we’ve delivered in these last four weeks to think they’ll be entertained,” Schmidt said. “And that it’s going to be a contest.”
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