Farrell: 'To cut a long story short, I actually thought that England deserved to win'

CHAMPIONSHIP TO WIN: Ireland boss Andy Farrell said England deserved their Guinness Six Nations victory in London on Saturday but reminded supporters there was still a championship title to win in Dublin next Saturday. Pic: Thomas Ash

Ireland boss Andy Farrell said England deserved their Guinness Six Nations victory in London on Saturday but reminded supporters there was still a championship title to win in Dublin next Saturday.

England produced their best performance of the 2024 campaign so far to upset the pre-match odds and beat the defending champions and hot favourites 23-22 at Twickenham, a Marcus Smith drop goal securing the victory with the last kick of the game after Ireland failed to cling onto a 22-20 lead delivered by James Lowe’s second try of the game on 72 minutes.

Ireland had led 12-8 at half-time thanks to four penalties from Jack Crowley which countered an opening try from Ollie Lawrence and George Ford penalty. Lowe’s first try on 43 minutes opened out a 17-8 lead but England stormed in front with tries from George Furbank and Ben Earls, the latter with Irish captain Peter O’Mahony in the sin bin. Then Irish left wing Lowe claimed his second score of the half only for more poor discipline and poor kicking from Ireland to give access to the home side and let in replacement fly-half Smith for his match-winning heroics.

"To cut a long story short, I actually thought that England deserved to win,” Farrell said.

“I thought we fought back unbelievably well against the run of play sometimes. Certainly coming in at half-time like that and again in the second half, finding a way to get ourselves in front but, again, to cut a long story short, I thought England deserved it with the pressure that they had and created. So congratulations to them.” 

The defeat ended Ireland’s winning start to the 2024 Six Nations with bonus-point victories over France, Italy and Wales giving Farrell’s 2023 Grand Slam winners a chance of retaining the title with a week to spare. Scotland’s shock defeat to Italy in Rome earlier in the day meant even a try bonus point was unnecessary and that a simple win would have kept the trophy in Irish hands if they could beat a previously out of sorts England.

Despite their shot at historic back-to-back Grand Slams having been denied them, Ireland can still claim consecutive titles if they beat the Scots at the Aviva Stadium next Saturday and Farrell wants a speedy and effective bounce back from his squad.

“You talk about the Grand Slam stuff, well every game matters,” the head coach said. “We want to win everything and we've never shied away from that.

“Today was obviously one of those games that we wanted to win but that's life. You dust yourself down. We've been very good at winning and moving on to the next one. We've got to be really good at losing as well, making sure that we congratulate England tonight, have a beer with them.

“I thought they played really well so we've got to dust ourselves down tomorrow and make sure that we turn up with a smile on our face because we've got a championship to win next weekend.” 

Captain O’Mahony focused on his team granting England easy access through penalties as the reason for defeat.

"We spoke about our discipline, obviously it was a big 'in' for them,” the flanker said. “I thought they were good and clinical at messing up our breakdown. We found it hard to get consistency in our phase play. I thought we striked quite well off set piece but we didn't seem to get into our a lot of phase (play).

“As we said beforehand, it was a massive pressure match, pressure environment. They're a quality side and I thought they showed that in spades tonight with the way they defended, clinical in their attack and disrupted a lot of the stuff that we wanted to do.” 

Farrell now wants to see his squad quickly learn the lessons of this defeat with a title still to play for.

"We said from the beginning that we'd like to be in with a chance of winning the competition on the last day and here we are. The lads are realists, they’ll learn the lessons quickly.

“There’s not a problem at all about getting the lads back on track for next week. Six Nations (titles) are unbelievably difficult to come by. To win them you tend to have a lot of ups and downs - the results today and what’s happened throughout this competition? That’s why we love it so much.

“For the neutral as well that was a fantastic game to watch. We were on the wrong side of that result but there will be absolutely no problem whatsoever getting back to work next week for what is a super important week for Irish rugby.”