Kidney alarmed by Ireland 'horror show'

Ireland coach Declan Kidney admitted his side had suffered a “horror show” as they slipped to a 66-28 defeat against New Zealand in New Plymouth.

Outscored by nine tries to four, it was a bad night for the Irish who have now failed to beat the New Zealanders in 23 Test matches.

Reduced to 14 men when number eight Jamie Heaslip was sent off with just more than 15 minutes gone, the visitors never stood a chance against a fired-up All Blacks outfit and matters just got worse when Ronan O’Gara was sin-binned for cynical play midway through the first half.

Kidney told Sky Sports 1: “It was a horror show. We gave away a lot of soft tries, missed tackles. We’ll have to have a long hard look at that.

Kidney was keen not to over-react to his players’ ill discipline, saying: “We’ll take a look at it. I wouldn’t be saying anything. Let’s take a look when we calm down a bit.”

Next up for Ireland is a match against New Zealand Maori on Friday.

Kidney does not anticipate any problems with his players’ state of mind after such a heavy defeat.

“They picked themselves up at half-time, you saw that,” he said. “We managed to keep the ball a little better in the second half.”

All Blacks captain Richie McCaw was happy with his side’s performance, especially debutants Israel Dagg, Benson Stanley and Ben Franks.

“The way we started the game, we’re pretty happy with,” he said. “There’s always going to be stuff to work on but I’m pretty happy.

“All the boys who played their first game had a pretty good day.”