Ireland have many lessons to learn

On Rugby: So many conflicting messages have emerged from an absorbing first two rounds of the Six Nations that it's hard to know what to make of them. Viewed in the context of Italy's bravest, most effective performance yet against England, Ireland's performance against them doesn't look quite so bad.

Then again, on a line through Scotland, on their efforts to date against France and Wales, the latter might be considered as eminently beatable as France were.

England reverted to type for much of the first 50 minutes or so against Italy in pursuing a route one approach based on brute force. It was not unlike the English Premiership, where sometimes you feel you might as well line up the two sets of 15 players, remove the ball, provide them with boxing gloves and see who'll have the most men standing at the end of it all.

When they applied a bit of width and alacrity to their game, they pulled away, although no doubt England may argue that it was the pummelling they meted out which eventually helped open up the Italians.

Still, the Mirco Bergamasco try, created by Gonzalo Canale, was as good a try as the championship has thrown up, and was made all the more creditable given the context of the game and the opposition.

Wales, too, scored a trademark try from their 22 instigated by Shane Williams, continued superbly off a recycle by Stephen Jones and Dwayne Peel, and finished off in typical fashion by a support run from Gareth Thomas.

They and their captain, looking fitter and healthier than the previous week, will come to Lansdowne Road with a renewed spring in their step, although they still miss the abrasiveness of Brent Cockbain and the ball-carrying up front of Ryan Jones, while Gethin Jenkins, another key performer last season, is one of many on the treadmill showing distinct signs of post-Lions distress.

The doubters - and there are many who still sniff at this Welsh team's success - will point to the fact that Scotland were long since reduced to 14 men by the red card which Steve Walsh brandished to Scott Murray. One couldn't help but feel sorry for the Scottish legend as he apologised to Ian Gough and Gareth Thomas for impetuously responding to a late tackle.

It is simply not his style to deliberately kick someone in the face. It was merely a flick from a prone position. Far worse happens with deliberate intent on a rugby pitch.

Walsh was arguably right, as he undoubtedly was with the penalty try to Wales and when he over-ruled two other Welsh tries for forward passes. Not many would have got both of those right. He comes across to some as a little arrogant or preening, but he's actually a good referee - provided there are no New Zealand teams involved against Lions opposition.

Nonetheless, one sincerely hopes that the Six Nations disciplinary panel, which features Ireland's Dr Barry O'Driscoll and Peter Boyle, shows some commonsense and takes into account Murray's disciplinary record, and does not rigidly apply the letter of the law with a ban of three to 12 months.

Otherwise, as the Guardian's Paul Rees argued in these pages yesterday, it will set a precedent which might well help create a football type environment for "simulation".

Nevertheless, while Wales' later tries came against 14 men, they had drawn some lines in the sand with the scrummaging power which generated their first try.

Ditto the English, and indeed the French against Ireland when they obliterated that first Irish scrum and then applied an aggressive blitz defence and a host of monstrous hits against ready-made Irish targets.

While it is understandable that Irish players would want to stick to the party line that Ireland played all the rugby, it is also a slightly disingenuous interpretation of what happened, for it implies that Ireland played all the good rugby, and this clearly wasn't the case.

Rugby first and foremost is a physical fight, and Ireland not only made little allowance for this, but even seemed to be taken aback by the impact of those early scrums, even though France had recalled the superior scrummaging of Olivier Milloud for the superior mobility of Sylvain Marconnet. Not for the first time in the Bernard Laporte reign, his choice of replacements - notably removing Milloud and leaving on Pieter de Villiers, who doesn't even hold down a regular starting place at Stade Francais these days - raised eyebrows in the French media. When asked, Laporte maintained that de Villiers was still doing lots of work around the pitch and making a high tackle count.

Yet a run through of the video confirms that he and Fabien Pelous were barely walking around the pitch in the last half-hour.

Most worrying of all, a slow start in the face of more fired-up opposition has become a feature of Ireland's recent performances, and suggests that the management and pre-match preparations are not pressing the right buttons.

The claim that Ireland were merely enacting a gameplan in the last half-hour which individual errors had undermined in the first 50 minutes also rings hollow. In keeping with what seems an over-emphasis on analysing the opposition, Ireland slavishly adhered to moving ball along a flat line and sought to bypass the advancing rush defence with inaccurate, long skip passes.

In the final half-hour, as the French defence eased off for either physical or mental reasons, or a combination of both, and the ruck ball quickened up, it was noticeable how much this strategy was abandoned. Passes were kept short and Ireland's array of game-breakers worked more closely together.

One couldn't help but feel that, as in previous lost causes late on, they were playing more off the cuff.

While clinging to the pluses more than the minuses is understandable, Ireland surely have to learn the lessons from Saturday, and other days, if they are to make full use of their abilities. They have become predictable.

On hearing of David Humphreys' impending Test retirement yesterday, the thought occurred as to why Ireland hardly ever attack the blind side.

Contrary to what Eddie O'Sullivan recently suggested, as with calling him a despot (which nobody did), no one has said that Ireland are conservative, just that they are predictable. There's a huge difference.

And if Italy and France employed a blitz defence against Ireland's flat alignment, one can be sure Wales will too. In fact, any opposing coach with a video recorder would. And one can also be sure that Wales will not start next Sunday week's game in the manner France played the last half-hour on Saturday.

Indeed, if France continue where they left off, Italy will beat them.

Seriously.