Off-colour Ireland revert to type

MAYBE this is the way that all opening games go for Ireland but it does not make them any easier to swallow.

True to type, Ireland’s 2011 World Cup campaign got off to a slow start at Stadium Taranaki yesterday with a hard-earned win against an inferior American outfit.

Just as they opened autumn’s Guinness Series with a slipshod performance in the rain against South Africa and followed it up with a sloppy first day of the 2011 Six Nations in Rome, there was a horrible sense of déjà vu in a wet and windy New Zealand this time around as a high error count undermined the monopoly on possession and territory Ireland enjoyed. Indeed it left Declan Kidney’s side more deflated than elated by a winning start to the Pool C qualifying stage.

This was not abject in the manner of Ireland’s narrow win against Georgia at the start of the 2007 World Cup but it was far from convincing ahead of a considerably more challenging fixture to come next Saturday against the pool favourites Australia. On the evidence of this performance, the Australians will not be losing too much sleep over it.

A run of four defeats in the pre-season Tests meant Ireland badly needed to turn in a strong performance against Eddie O’Sullivan’s Eagles and, even if the bad weather conditions ruled out the possibility of running up a big total against the tier-two nation, Kidney’s players left an uncomfortable number of points out on the field through a combination of handling errors, missed place kicks and poor decision-making.

“Conditions,” said substitute fly-half Ronan O’Gara, “were difficult, but I looked up at the screen at one stage when I was on the sideline and I think we had eight to two handling errors; that’s too many, you know. When you turn over the ball that much, it’s hard to get your game going. I don’t think we got our game going too frequently tonight.

“There is no denying, when you lose the games in the summer and then we had a chance tonight, we were probably looking for a big performance and when we woke up this morning the weather wasn’t great. But you have to get over these things and play what’s in front of you and play the conditions, and I suppose at times when we kept the ball we made it look easy but then we didn’t do it with any frequency whatsoever, so that’s disappointing.”

O’Gara had been a 51-minute replacement for Jonny Sexton, whose otherwise solid game had been thrown off kilter by a poor place-kicking performance. Sexton could only send over one penalty and a conversion from six attempts as Ireland failed to capitalise on the US indiscipline which was the consequence of a 65-35 first-half tackle count during a heroic defensive effort.

Ireland’s dominance at the set-piece was further squandered by a lack of fluency in the backline, which resulted in only four offloads and a litany of dropped balls and missed passes.

“That’s the big difference between European and Test rugby,” O’Gara said. “We were probably looking for a miracle pass here and there. You get flashes of genius in international rugby in one of three games, you just have to keep wearing teams down, keep holding on to the ball and going through it and then putting over afella with just simple hands at the end of 15 or 16 phases, or else a penalty results.

“We’re probably looking to come up with big plays too frequently and we’ve just got to get back to basics and hold on to the ball and keep our error rate down.”

There were three tries, all well worked in a 22-minute period straddling half time as Tommy Bowe crossed the line twice either side of a Rory Best touchdown.

Game over, essentially, but not before the Americans finished the game on a high as centre Paul Emerick intercepted a lazy pass on halfway from Gordon D’Arcy.

It was possibly the only time they looked like crossing the line but head coach O’Sullivan and his players deserve enormous credit for the way they defended, competed at the breakdown and, by drawing more numbers into the rucks, slowed Irish ball down to a plodding pace.

The bottom line, of course, is that it was a victory and in true cup-rugby fashion. It seemed enough for the thousands of Irish fans who witnessed a first Test victory in five games, many of whom sang at the tops of their voices long into the night in New Plymouth but O’Gara knows it will need much more to turn the tables on Australia next weekend.

“We have work to do, obviously,” he said. “We’re massive underdogs going into the game, we have a lot to prove and I think we have a lot to prove to ourselves.

“The big key for us this week is to get it right and we’re aware we have great support. The fans were unbelievable tonight.

“Next weekend is a key game. I think we’re looking for performance first of all and then the result will be further on in the game.”

The cause should be boosted by the return to fitness up of full-back Rob Kearney, loosehead prop Cian Healy and back row Sean O’Brien, all of whom were kept out of the fray yesterday but can be expected to start against the Wallabies. A return to accuracy, continuity and a quick tempo would also be more than welcome.

Referee: Craig Joubert (South Africa).