As shakedown games go, this one ended up being a little more shaky than Ireland might have expected. The final score said 19-12 to Ireland but that didn’t really tell the story of the game so much as gesture vaguely in the direction of the side that took their chances with more efficiency, writes Tom Savage.

ANDREW CONWAY is getting his due and it has been a long time coming.

For all the elements that make up this brave new world for Andy Farrell and the Ireland team as they head into the 2020 Guinness Six Nations, it is one of the fundamental lessons from the disappointments of 2019 that will register the strongest on matchday one.

Tommy Bowe scored 30 tries in 69 appearances for Ireland so how excited is he by the back three that starts on Saturday, what does he expect to see from Mike Catt’s attack as the Guinness Six Nations progresses and how does he feel about that Croke Park loss to the Scots ten years ago?

The question didn’t come from out of left field so much as the Far East. Where, asked the Japanese journalist, would you rank Ireland on a scale from one to 100 right now?

Just five training sessions into his tenure as Ireland attack coach, Mike Catt is nevertheless expecting “some good stuff” from Andy Farrell’s team against Scotland in Dublin tomorrow.

Fifteen weeks had passed since Ireland were turfed out of the World Cup by the All Blacks by the time Jordan Larmour sat down today wearing his IRFU gear.

When Rory Best blamed Joe Schmidt for taking too much control in 2019 — he inadvertently heaped pressure on the class of 2020. With the Kiwi out of the loop now that excuse no longer exists.

Ireland turn the page from one era to the next this week as the 2020 Guinness Six Nations gets underway with not just a new coaching team but also a fresh player leadership group.

Jacob Stockdale is moving on from a disappointing World Cup, his gaze firmly fixed on a new era for Irish rugby and, he hopes, a clean slate under head coach Andy Farrell.

The Leinster out-half was named Ireland captain by Andy Farrell for the upcoming Six Nations, replacing Rory Best, who retired after last year’s World Cup.

So here we are again, on the cusp of another championship, the first of the decade.

IRELAND’S implosion at the World Cup sent ripples in all sorts of directions.

The departure of head coach, Joe Schmidt, in November, also left a vacancy for someone to steer Ireland’s offensive gameplan and successor, Andy Farrell, reconnected with former fellow England assistant, Mike Catt.

Andy Farrell believes he will be leading Ireland into a new era with a squad for the upcoming Guinness Six Nations he believes has got the lot.

The official changing of the guard from Joe Schmidt to Andy Farrell took place in Abbotstown on the Sunday before Christmas.

The Leinster wing was among the 45 players invited to the national team’s gathering at the new training base at the National Sports Campus in Abbotstown last week

Andy Farrell promised his Ireland squad for the 2020 Guinness Six Nations will be picked on form, not reputation.

There's no room for Rob Kearney, Seán Cronin, Jordi Murphy, Jack Carty, John Ryan or Kieran Marmion – with newly eligible Jamison Gibson-Park jumping ahead of the Connacht man at scrum-half.

Brian Ashton was a prophet in a land that couldn’t understand his message when he took over as Ireland head coach in the 1990s.

The rawness of a World Cup quarter-final in which Ireland failed to produce their best effort will live long with Johnny Sexton but the veteran fly-half insists there will be no blame game when the IRFU produces its review of a faltering 2019 campaign for Joe Schmidt’s team.

Johnny Sexton may have only been half-joking when he suggested the knives would be out for himself and half-back partner Conor Murray once Ireland had departed this World Cup.

Ireland have been knocked out of the World Cup at the quarter-final stage for the seventh time in nine tournaments.

Ireland’s flock is all out of offerings to lay at the altar of Joe Schmidt.

Conor O’Shea has ruled himself out of becoming the new Munster CEO, insisting his focus is on getting Italy ready for the World Cup in Japan.

The man who rules European rugby astride a turbo-charged zimmer frame is contracted to make his last stand next year at the age of 37, assuming he lasts that long.

Joe Schmidt deservedly received the plaudits for guiding Ireland to a Grand Slam on Saturday. But the New Zealander was quick to credit the efforts of his backroom team in the unforgettable spring campaign. Rory Keane reports.

Conor O’Shea is just a handful of months into a four-year term as Italy coach but the former Ireland international has already begun to make an impression far beyond the borders of the national squad.

Conor O’Shea says he is “honoured, humbled, and excited” to have been appointed Italy’s new head coach on a four-year contract that will incorporate the 2019 World Cup.

Forget the debacle that was England’s World Cup campaign, Ireland believe that in landing Andy Farrell as their new defence coach, they have staged a coup in hiring a British & Irish Lions series winner.

Heyneke Meyer believes “the time has come for change” after bringing an end to his reign as South Africa head coach.

Joe Simpson has called on new England boss Eddie Jones to employ high-octane, attacking rugby.

Eddie Jones will hold talks with Chris Robshaw early in his reign as England head coach as he searches for a captain in the image of New Zealand great Richie McCaw to embody the values of his team.

The world of rugby and beyond yesterday has paid tribute to All Black legend Jonah Lomu, who passed away suddenly at the age of 40.

Argentinian’s transformation of Aussie scrum means Welsh pack must up game, says Baldwin...

England head coach Stuart Lancaster is convinced Sam Burgess will remain a rugby union player, despite speculation he will return to league rugby after the World Cup. Odds have been shortened on Burgess ending his cross-code adventure after only a year and one bookmaker has stopped taking bets, amid reports he is set to join Leeds Rhinos.

England 13 Australia 33: Having been in the World Cup for just 15 days, England are now set to enter a month-long period of reviews, damning indictments and calls for heads to roll.

Major sporting events can do strange things to people. Days blur into weeks and weeks into months and before you know it you are cocooned in a bubble outside of which almost everything else takes on a strangely abstract meaning

England have hit back in the escalating row over obstruction that has ignited the build-up to Friday’s RBS 6 Nations opener in Cardiff by stating that Wales use similar tactics.

RBS Six Nations: Wales v England: Shaun Edwards believes Wales are "in a better place" ahead of this season’s Six Nations Championship than they were 12 months ago.

South Africa have recalled World Cup winners JP Pietersen and Schalk Burger among five changes for Saturday’s QBE International against England at Twickenham.

Just as Brian O’Driscoll wanted to leave the international stage with a Six Nations medal around his neck, so Jonny Wilkinson has his eyes firmly focussed on a gilt-edged finale to a glittering rugby career.