VIDEO: Victory to be savoured before next challenge

Ireland 24 France 9: Let us delay talk of Argentina and quarter-finals for a moment, this victory over the French needs to be savoured.

This was a game that had been talked about for three years, since the day Declan Kidney and Brian O’Driscoll pondered the World Cup draw in a London art gallery and looked ahead to a tournament in which neither head coach nor captain would feature.

It was a contest that pitted two Six Nations rivals with so little to choose between them that only nine points had separated their four previous meetings, two of which were draws.