First Test Talking Points: If it wasn't for second-half rally Ireland would be counting the days to home 

Ireland's Andrew Porter and James Ryan

Frustration but at least a chance to rectify matters 

It’s the hope that kills you. A bright start, questions being asked of an All Blacks side whose management went into this one under a bit of pressure, and the prospect of a first ever Irish win in 13 attempts in New Zealand starts to gain a bit of real momentum.

Half an hour gone and Ireland pressing forward, trailing 7-5 and looking to stretch the home defence at Eden Park. And then the wheels come off.

Three converted tries, all sloppily conceded by Ireland, and it’s a damage-limitation exercise at 28-5 at the break, with captain Johnny Sexton off with a head injury and probably out of next week’s clash in Dunedin.

Ireland's Johnny Sexton looks on from the bench late in the game

A repeat of the Hamilton horror show from a decade ago was on the cards, so Ireland will rightly take some encouragement from their second-half display. At least three times they were held up or spilled the ball over the line. The game may have been gone from them but they will feel they were a lot closer to the All Blacks than 42-19.

But the key lesson, as if Ireland needed it at this stage, is the level of damage New Zealand will do if a team crumbles as Ireland did in the 11 minutes before the break.

Andy Farrell and his players will relish the chance to try to rectify some of this next week. That, in itself, is a positive because if it wasn’t for that second-half battling display everyone would be just counting the days to getting home.

Fail to prepare 

It’s becoming glaringly obvious that Ireland’s preparations for a five-match tour of New Zealand might be coming up short, not least in bringing enough players for a grueling tour. Of course, it’s hard to legislate for injuries but fears that a 40-man squad was thin for this tour didn’t take long coming to pass.

Plucking a hooker off the beach in Portugal, who hasn’t played for Ireland in over two and a half years, and throwing him in against the Maoris inside 24 hours of landing in New Zealand, wearing another player’s boots and borrowed gumshields, just smacks of poor preparation although, in fairness, Niall Scannell played well.

The injury problems at prop, which has seen Leinster’s third-choice loosehead Ed Byrne being drafted, have now become almost farcical.

Byrne’s flight was delayed and he missed the match and with doubts about Cian Healy after his midweek injury, former Leinster player Michael Bent was summoned and warmed-up after Finlay Bealham was ruled out with Covid.

Bent, last capped by Ireland seven years ago, retired from Leinster last season and the 36-year old currently plays with Taranaki. He was added as an ‘additional player’ and would have been on the bench if any of the props didn’t come through the warm-up.

Tom O’Toole took Bealham’s place on the bench, with Healy not brought on during the game and Bent left to wonder what the heck was going on?

Would it really have cost the IRFU that much to bring six or seven extra players?

Scoring exploits 

You’d have fancied Johnny Sexton closing the gap to double figures on Ronan O’Gara in this one to be Ireland’s all-time top scorer. Sexton is 102 points behind O’Gara’s 1,083 haul but his only opportunity was to convert Keith Earls’ try and he never got hold of it and remains on 981 points. David Humphreys is Ireland’s third top scorer on 560 points, followed by Michael Kieran on 308 and Eric Elwood fifth on 296.

Earls’ early try takes his international haul to 35, 11 behind Brian O’Driscoll’s record 46. Tommy Bowe is third on the list with 30, followed by Denis Hickie on 29 and Shane Horgan on 21.

Then again, few players or teams go on a tour to New Zealand expecting to greatly enhance their scoring records.

Reece’s road 

Sevu Reece was due to join Pat Lam’s Connacht squad in the autumn of 2018 from Waikato but a guilty plea to a domestic violence incident saw the province and the IRFU withdraw the contract. But that was far from the end of Reece’s rugby career.

By December 2018 the Crusaders brought him as cover, by the spring of 2019 he had nailed down a permanent spot on the wing as they won the Super Rugby title and by that summer he made his All Blacks debut against Argentina.

His intercept try on the half hour, which opened the floodgates in this one, was his 14th try in 18 games for New Zealand.