Bright start but Ireland lose way

RUGBY/Wales 19 Ireland 13:THIS WAS taking one-that-got-away to ridiculous levels. Even in recent times, Irish rugby has become used to utterly annoying defeats but this was right up there. Another eminently winnable game was lost, and abject officiating and Irish mistakes contributed almost as much as anything Wales did. As defeats go, this verged on careless.

Once again much of the building blocks were there. The line-out was the best it’s been in aeons, with Paul O’Connell having another big game, while their breakdown work was largely effective and efficient, with the enforced employment of Peter Stringer also serving to quicken up the tempo. The scrums were rare and hardly an issue.

But for the incompetence of the officials, and especially Peter Allan, Ireland’s defence would have kept a gifted Welsh backline tryless. They employed their use of double-tacklers to hold up opposition ball carriers until Jonathan Kaplan deemed it a maul, thereby slowing down ball or earning several turnovers when it went to ground.

Warren Gatland was full of admiration for this, and virtually the whole pack and several of the backs made contributions.

By and large, it was a relatively disciplined defensive effort as well, save for a here-we-go-again spell mid-way through the first-half when a rash of four penalties – punctuated by Cian Healy’s especially needless late hit on Mike Phillips – which allowed Wales to recover from Brian O’Driscoll’s early try.

All of which in turn offers the most compelling evidence of all that Wales probably wouldn’t have scored a try without the help of the ball boy and an inefficient touch judge.

Granted, Ireland were not playing especially well, as O’Driscoll freely admitted, and were only reasonably in control when leading by four points at the time. But it utterly changed the momentum of the game. Ahead for the first time in the game, Wales were suddenly buoyant, and Ireland seemingly tinged with self-doubt.

Gatland also admitted Ireland’s patient probing through the phases cleverly corralled their midfield hitmen, Jamie Roberts and Jonathan Davies, thereby isolating forwards in open play against backs. It was the patient creation of such a miss-match between Tommy Bowe and Alun-Wyn Jones, that enabled the winger to free his hands in the tackle and put Brian O’Driscoll over for his record-equalling 24th championship try. As Jamie Roberts shot up outside, it also exposed the best means of getting in behind the blitz defence while keeping the ball in hand.

Ireland also worked an open side of backs against four Welsh defenders comprising three forwards with the last play of the half, albeit they were a couple of phases late to recognise this. It enabled Luke Fitzgerald to cleverly put Gordon D’Arcy away on the left touchline and then take the return offload.

This led to O’Gara making it 13-9 at the break, though there also seemed a compelling case for a yellow card against Phillips for slowing the ball after halting Seán O’Brien’s barnstorming run to the posts – as in Murryfield, O’Brien was almost too strong and quick for his own team-mates.

However, far too often Ireland lost patience and opted for grubber kicks, and here Ronan O’Gara, even the dangerous if under-used Bowe, and others were culpable. Instead, rather than over-using O’Connell as first receiver to take it up, their running game needed more variety, more decoy runners and more inside runners – more use could have been made of Bowe as a blindside winger off the outhalf’s inside channel and also O’Brien.

Furthermore, Ireland’s kicking game was awful, and pockmarked by sliced and miscued kicks. The malaise became an epidemic, even affecting both Jonathan Sexton and Paddy Wallace when they joined the fray with their first efforts. Stringer too and even O’Driscoll sliced kicks.

For sure, credit has to go to the Welsh defence too, for the way they fronted up on the gain line with big hits, or scrambled when they had to. The superb Sam Warburton, Matt Rees and Alun-Wyn Jones seemed to be everywhere, as did Phillips, for whom this game represented a compelling return to form. And for the third game in a row their defence effectively closed out the opposition.

For their third game running also, Ireland had begun positively, purposefully and coherently, to be rewarded with a seven-pointer, only to then gradually lose their way. For a team that only three games ago seemingly regarded kicking the ball as against their principles, suddenly Ireland have begun to over-kick.

Not for the first time this season, you were left wondering if this Irish team really understands and believes in what it’s doing.

From being castigated for his limited use of the bench, Declan Kidney has now almost become too pro-active. Sod’s law decreed that Sexton’s first kick would be sliced out on the full and that it would lead to the controversial Phillips try, and that he would then miss an eminently kickable penalty. He appears to have let the to-ing and fro-ing between the 10s and O’Gara’s re-emergence get to him, but in the circumstances Sexton actually recovered his composure very well, striking the ball well and giving the team direction.

Ireland still created chances to win, not least when Fitzgerald over-ran what should have been a try-scoring offload by Donnacha O’Callaghan instead of a forward pass. Then, just to apply the coup de grace, Paddy Wallace stepped inside and ignored what looked like a probably try-scoring pass to Keith Earls. Perhaps Wallace was mindful of Ireland needing a converted try to win the game, but it would have been far more advisable to take the score first and worry about the conversion later – even if it was from the touchline.

Scoring sequence:

3 mins – O’Driscoll try, O’Gara con 0-7; 19 mins – Hook pen 3-7; 28 mins – Hook pen 6-7; 33 mins – O’Gara pen 6-10; 39 mins – Halfpenny pen 9-10; 40 (+1) mins – O’Gara pen 9-13; 51 mins – Phillips try, Hook con 16-13; 69 mins – Hook pen 19-13.

WALES: L Byrne (Ospreys); L Halfpenny (Blues), J Roberts (Blues), J Davies (Scarlets), S Williams (Ospreys); J Hook (Ospreys), M Phillips (Ospreys); P James (Ospreys), M Rees (Scarlets, capt), C Mitchell (Ospreys), B Davies (Blues), A-W Jones (Ospreys), D Lydiate (Dragons), S Warburton (Blues), R Jones (Ospreys). Replacements: J Yapp (Blues) for Mitchell (13 mins), J Thomas (Ospreys) for R Jones (60 mins), R Hibbard (Ospreys) for Rees (73 mins). Not used: R McCusker (Scarlets), D Peel (Sale Sharks), S Jones (Scarlets), M Stoddart (Scarlets).

IRELAND: L Fitzgerald (Leinster); T Bowe (Ospreys), B O’Driscoll (Leinster, capt), G D’Arcy (Leinster), K Earls (Munster); R O’Gara (Munster), E Reddan (Leinster); C Healy (Leinster), R Best (Ulster), M Ross (Leinster), D OCallaghan (Munster), P O’Connell (Munster), S O’Brien (Leinster), D Wallace (Munster), J Heaslip (Leinster). Replacements: P Stringer (Munster) for Reddan (1 min), J Sexton (Leinster) for O’Gara (50 mins), T Court (Ulster) for Ross, D Leamy (Munster) for Heaslip (both 69 mins), P Wallace (Ulster) for Fitzgerald (73 mins), S Cronin (Connacht) for Best, L Cullen (Leinster) for O’Callaghan (both 76 mins).

Referee: Jonathan Kaplan (South Africa).

MIKE PHILLIPS TRY

THE BUILD UP: 49.04 – Jonny Sexton replaces Ronan O'Gara. 49.34 – Sexton takes possession from Peter Stringer just over his own 10 metre line and lofts a kick out on the full. The ball bounces into the crowd.

THE INCIDENT: 49.49 - Shane Williams retrieves the ball but Welsh hooker Matthew Rees takes a new ball from the ball boy, 20 metres up field, and takes a quick lineout to scrumhalf Mike Phillips. 49.55 – Phillips fends off Tommy Bowe to touch down in the right corner.

THE LAW

19.2 QUICK THROW-IN

(d) For a quick throw-in, the player must use the ball that went into touch. A quick throw-in is not permitted if another person has touched the ball apart from the player throwing it in and an opponent who carried it into touch. The same team throws into the lineout.

THE DEBATE

50.02 – Paul O'Connell signals for referee Jonathan Kaplan to refer to the Television Match Official Geoff Warren. Kaplan tells him to "Go away, please." Brian O'Driscoll identifies himself as the captain. Kaplan signals for him to wait as he turns to touch judge Peter Allan.

THE CONVERSATION

Allan: "… he has taken the throw-in quickly."

Kaplan(interrupting): "Is it the correct ball?"

Allan: "Yes, it is. Yes. Yes."

Kaplan: "It is?"

Allan: "Yes."

THE DECISION: Kaplan awards a try without speaking to O'Driscoll.