Ireland U20s foiled in frenetic battle
Wales were deserving winners, edging out their hosts four to three in the try count but, in truth, the gap in class on the night was wider, with Shane Daly’s last-gasp try reducing the gap on the scoreboard.
“Play, play,” was the regular shout from the Welsh coaching box.
They both did that.
The ingredients were there from before kick-off. Both coaches spoke about giving their players licence to play this last week and the fast 4G pitch, absence of rain and intermittent light breeze made for an ideal canvas on which to play.
The visitors dominated large tracts of the evening. Time and again, they punched through the phases, forcing Ireland into a series of wearying defensive drills, and it paid dividends with tries from hooker Dafydd Hughes and lock Adam Beard at the beginning and end of the second quarter. Beard was one of half a dozen Welshmen with significant senior exposure with the Welsh regions this season – and two of them started on the bench. Ireland couldn’t match that and their inexperience extended to the fact that they fielded 12 rookies at this level to eight from Wales.
Much has been made of the greater physicality brought to this grade by the Irish boys this year but they were matched and more by a big and abrasive Welsh pack that was able to win a greater share of possession and edge matters in the scrum to boot.
Ireland had to make do with scraps – they didn’t spend one spell of pressure inside the opposition 22 in the first period – but they ate well on the few they scavenged, with coach Nigel Carolan’s ambition for his players to play what they see paying off in spades at times.
Hookers, locks, flankers: they all joined in the fun, popping off offloads in front of an approving crowd as well as senior team coach Joe Schmidt whose own side has become, fairly or not, tagged as something more restrained and structured in its approach.
Out-half Johnny McPhillips had them 3-0 in after the first play from a barely earned penalty but the Ulster 10 carved Wales open two minutes later with a delightful cross-kick to wing Hugo Keenan whose pass set centre Jimmy O’Brien free.
O’Brien almost made it half the length of the pitch to touch down, only to be stopped at the flag, but Connacht blindside Cillian Gallagher showed superb athleticism to make up the ground behind him, slide over with ball in hand and claim the five points.
Another passage just before the half-hour mark may have produced only a penalty rather than a try but it was, if anything, even better with openside Will Connors breaking the line before a trio of offloads took the home team from one 22 to the other.
And yet the more consistent Welsh were worth their six-point, 20-14 advantage at the break and they extended it all too easily within a breath of the restart when scrum-half John Poland’s loose pass was intercepted by out-half Dan Jones who went over unopposed for a converted gift.
On the game went at its unrelenting helter-skelter pace but Ireland reverted to national type to bring themselves back into it – but only after another outrageous offload from hooker Adam McBurney – with Kelvin Brown digging over after a lineout and maul.
A six-point gap stayed that way with the conversion sent wide and that was symbolic of Ireland on the night: capable of some great things but unable to stitch it all together and as likely to offer up points and claim them themselves.
Sure enough, a yellow card for lock Peter Claffey and a penalty from Jones left Ireland chasing even harder heading in to the last quarter. Then Wales ran the ball in broken play after a Max Deegan blockdown and ‘magicked’ a try from Harri Millard for their troubles.
That was game over, though Daly would have the last say.
J Power (UCD/Leinster); M Byrne (Terenure/Leinster), S Daly (Cork Con/Munster), J O’Brien (UCD/Leinster), H Keenan UCD/Leinster); J McPhillips (QUB/Ulster), J Poland (Cork Con/Munster); A Porter (UCD/Leinster), A McBurney (Ballymena/Ulster), C O’Donnell (Sligo/Connacht); P Claffey (Galwegians/Connacht), J Ryan (Lansdowne/Leinster); C Gallagher (Sligo/Connacht), W Connors (UCD/Leinster), M Deegan (Lansdowne/Leinster).
Replacements: K Brown (Shannon/Munster) for Deegan (20-31); K Brown for Connors (HT); C Kenny (Buccaneers/Connacht) for O’Donnell (60); C O’Brien (Clontarf/Leinster) for McPhillips and S O’Connor (Cashel/Munster) for Claffey (both 66); S Fenton (Young Munster/Munster) for McBurney and S Kerins (Sligo/Connacht) for Poland (both 74); J Bollard (DUFC/Leinster) for Porter (77); B Connon (Newcastle Falcons/Exiles) for Power (77).
E Williams; EW Benham, H Millard, O Watkin, K Giles; D Jones, D Smith; C Domachowski, D Hughes, D Lewis; S Lewis-Hughes, A Beard; T Phillips, S Evans, H Keddie.
Replacements: R Morgan-Williams for Smith (41); J Thomas for Giles (59); J Evans for Jones (68); L Brown for Lewis and M Sieniawski for Evans (both 72); B Morgan for Benham (74); R Lewis for Domachowski (77).
T Charabas (France).
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