Kearney must be automatic choice
Kearney’s enthusiasm after arriving as a first-half replacement for Gordon D’Arcy was one of the few highlights to emerge from a difficult afternoon at Croke Park.
From the moment he set foot on the pitch as a replacement for the injured D’Arcy and crucially fielded an up and under, to the end of the game, when he and Andrew Trimble blew Italian winger Kaine Robertson into touch to bring the show to an end, Kearney enjoyed a high star rating.
It wasn’t the way he imagined lining out in Croke Park, but, as former Louth minor footballer, it was a dream fulfilled: “It was an experience beyond my wildest dreams to play in front of 75,000 people in the magnificent Croke Park.”
He won his first cap in Argentina last summer, but Saturday was special said an elated Kearney: “It was my first time playing in that arena; in front of so many people it was amazing, and it’s something I will never forget.”
“Personally I thought the match was fantastic. It was the first time I’ve played in that arena and it was something pretty special.
Kearney conceded there is room for vast improvement against the French, but he did point out: “On a difficult day, it was crucial to get the win. We left a few chances behind, but it was important that we created those opportunities. Hopefully we can create even more in France and capitalise on them as well. Were it not for a dropped pass here or a forward pass there, we could well have been in a much more comfortable situation.”
Kearney was honest enough to admit Ireland could have been picked off late in the game and questioned the tactic of continuing to play the ball up the middle through the forwards when the clock had already reached 80 minutes: “The last couple of minutes were a bit scary. My understanding was that the game was over. However, we played around with the ball a bit and that was bizarre, maybe we should have put it out of play. Then we turned possession over and they counter-attacked. Happily, we just managed to close the Italian player down and knock him into touch to bring it to an end.”
Malcolm O’Kelly also candidly admitted this was a flawed performance, although he insisted that Italy won’t be pushed about by any team in the tournament.
He did admit his disappointment at coughing up line-out ball to the Azzurri and explained that it had come about through confusion about the calls and the timing of the jumping: “The problems were in the early stages and I think we got it right as the game wore on,” he said.
O’Kelly paid tribute to Italy: “Of all the teams in the Six Nations, they will always fight to the bitter end. They gained, as they always do, in confidence the more they were able to stick with us.
“Our biggest problem was that we failed to stick away our chances and, in that sense, we probably deserved a scary finish.
“We’re going to have to get our heads around the trip to Paris quickly because we don’t have much time. Yet, over the next few days we have to get down to hard work and come up with improvement.”
However, he is convinced they can get their act together in time: “I believe that some small mistakes were crucial in the way the game panned out. We could have scored a couple of more tries in the first half, another in the second.
We spent a lot of time searching for the second try that might have killed off their challenge.
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