Ireland focus on Australia after missed chances against England cost them victory
ONTO NEXT GAME: Ireland now focusing on game against Australia after their opening game draw against England. Pic: ©INPHO/Darren Stewart
Ireland coach Richie Murphy was not overly concerned with flyhalf Sam Prendergast’s patchy goal-kicking during their World Championship opener against England on Saturday.
Ireland drew 34-34 with their Six Nations rivals with both sides earning three log points for their efforts. Had Prendergast landed even one of the four reasonably straightforward conversion attempts he missed, Ireland would’ve taken a maximum five points from the fixture.
England’s goalkicker Connor Slevin landed five from five kicks, underlining the value of accurate goalkicking in a World Championship. England were outscored by six tries to four and were marginally second best for most of the game, but they managed to keep the scoreboard moving through Slevin’s boot.
“Sam’s goalkicking is not a concern for me. Sam’s a top class goalkicker but he had a bad day. Like any team, you can’t just rely on your goalkicker to win the game for you,” Murphy said.
“He will be very disappointed and will work hard on it. But he will move on pretty quickly.”
The nature of the tournament means that teams have to move on quickly.
Ireland face Australia on Thursday, 29 June in a crucial second outing with no more room for slip ups. The top three teams in each of the three pools, and the best second placed-team across the three pools, qualify for the semi-finals.
Australia beat Fiji 46-37 in their opening match and top the standings with five points in Pool B. Ireland will have to win at the least, but a bonus point will almost certainly be vital in the final analysis.
Ireland might have to do it without impressive centre Hugh Cooney, who was red-carded for a head-to-head clash when attempting a tackle against England's Cusick. It was totally accidental but with zero tolerance for head clashes in the game, the card was unfortunate.
Murphy accepted the red card but he felt several other similar incidents were not punished in the same way.
“I can understand why the red card was issued (to Cooney) but I can’t understand how three or four other head shots in the game were missed,’ Murphy said.
“There was a double head shot when (England flank) Greg Fisilau was yellow-carded, so I don’t understand it at all.”
Cooney also appeared to be concussed in the incident that led to his red card, which has led to some doubt about his participation in the important second match.
“I didn’t really catch what the doc said about, but he’s likely to be in trouble for the next game, you would think,” Murphy said.
Ireland will have to adapt their game plan slightly as the heavy rain in the Western Cape over the past fortnight has made underfoot conditions tricky.
Ireland face Australia at the same venue they met England – the impressive Paarl Gymnasium, which is about 75km from Cape Town. The school has excellent rugby facilities and is one of the major breeding grounds of Springbok rugby talent with Jean de Villiers and Schalk Burger, just two of its 31 Test products.
The pitch held up pretty well considering the severe weather that led to numerous floods in the region during the past two weeks.
Ireland were perhaps guilty of playing too much rugby at times against England, although six tries is a good return as well.
“We are a team that likes to play and keep ball in hand, but we probably overplayed our hand at times and didn’t get out of our end as efficiently as we would have liked so there is a little to look at there,” Murphy said.
“I thought when we got into the 22 we were quite accurate in what we were doing. We definitely need to kick a bit more because it’s hard to carry out of your end (in these conditions).
“We need to have a look at that because we probably didn’t execute our kicking game as well as we would’ve liked.”
Discipline will also have to improve for the next outing as a string of penalties, plus Cooney’s red card and a yellow for flank Diarmuid Mangan didn’t assist the cause either.
“Our discipline really let us down, I think we gave away more penalties than the English boys did. We gave them easy access into our half which ended up hurting us,” captain Gus McCarthy said.
“Our goal was to win the match but it is not over, we’ll move on now and focus on next week.”
Tries: S Prendergast, G Hadden, J McNabney, R Quinn, H McErlean, H Cooney. Conversions: Prendergast (2).
Tries: A Opoku-Fordjour, Penalty try, J Cusick (2). Conversions: C Slevin (3) Penalties: Slevin (2).
H McErlean, A Osborne, H Cooney, J Devine, H Gavin, S Prendergast, F Gunne, G Hadden, G McCarthy (c), P McCarthy, E O’Connell, C O’Tighearnaigh, D Mangan, R Quinn, J McNabney
M Clein, G Morris, F Barrett, C Irvine, B Gleeson, O Cawley, M Lynch, J Nicholson
S Harris, T Elliott, R Ma’asi-White, J Woodward, J Jenkins, C Slevin, C Bracken, A Opoku-Fordjour, F Theobald-Thomas, A Fasogbon, H Cuckson, L Chessum (c), F Carnduff, G Fisilau, C Cunningham-South
: N Jibulu, A McArthur, J Halliwell, N Michelow, T Woodman, N Thomas, L Johnson, J Cusick
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