Ireland take plenty of positives from another tough French examination

Women’s Six Nations: France 38 Ireland 17

In time-honoured fashion this was, as expected, something of an endurance test in Le Mans for Ireland. But amid the carnival-like celebrations of yet another French home win in the fixture there was enough in this Irish performance to spark real hope again.

This was France’s 11th home win out of 11 in the Women’s Six Nations against Ireland to kick-start a campaign that is widely expected to culminate in another last weekend Grand Slam shoot-out with England. But while allowing for France’s wastefulness at times, Ireland built some solid foundations in readiness for their pivotal round two meeting with Italy, who were beaten 48-0 by England in Parma on Sunday, at the RDS next Sunday in that other league within a league.

There was a palpable coherence, energy and organisation to this performance, and certainly so in defence, compared to the 53-3 loss to France in Musgrave Park a year ago, when Les Bleus played for an hour with 14 players.

For sure, defence is the easiest fix and last year’s bar was decidedly low. Even so, where Ireland were outscored by nine tries to nil in that 53-3 defeat, here the tally was 5-2. Where Ireland made 135 tackles and missed 43 in Cork, here they made 175 and missed 17.

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Irish rugby has a good recent track record of delving into the pool of English coaches, and bringing in Declan Danaher as defence coach already looks like something of a coup by Scott Bemand.

The other foundation stone for a rebuild are the set pieces, and in this regard, Ireland again had issues against the more powerful and athletic French forwards. Ireland lost four lineouts out of nine and experienced some serious pain at scrum time, all the more so when the reserves came into play in the second period.

There’s a kicking piece that we’re going to keep going after and what kicking pressure looks like. I think our attack game, once we got into the right areas of the pitch, there’s a little bit of fine-tuning there

The restricted game plan, with recalled outhalf Nicole Fowley dropping into the pocket and playing territory until replaced by Dannah O’Brien at half-time, served to give Ireland a foothold in the game.

The attack will clearly need more work, as evidenced by the lack of opportunity for Béibhinn Parsons and Katie Corrigan. By comparison, the inventive French scrumhalf Pauline Bourdon Sansus scored within barely two minutes and set up another one, while France produced some superb passages of offloading (making 22 to Ireland’s four).

But save for the unplayable Madoussou Fall, France’s offloading game was kept reasonably in check through the well-rehearsed focus on double tackles and scrambling. In the second half, France had to resort to their power game for a close-range finish by Fall followed by two tries from their traditionally potent catch-and-drives.

Ireland responded with a patiently worked try by Aoife Wafer off a maul of their own, and a late score by the industrious inside centre Aoife Dalton which was a reward for her unstinting work ethic and the team’s defence.

The two tries are already within one of last year’s entire Six Nations tally, and Bemand gave a balanced appraisal of where this team are at and of this performance.

“I think defensively, you want to be hard to beat, and that’s anywhere on the pitch. I think there are probably a few areas in the game that we’ll go after but France, as [captain] Edel [McMahon] said, are a World Cup-contending side.

“Basically, I think we can still put more pressure on teams. We probably gave them a little too much respect to start with, which meant we were probably defending in the wrong areas of the pitch that we want to be defending in.

“There’s a kicking piece that we’re going to keep going after and what kicking pressure looks like. I think our attack game, once we got into the right areas of the pitch, there’s a little bit of fine-tuning there. There’s lineouts really that we fancy ourselves more often than not to be winning, which lets you then build your pressure up the pitch, and maybe just left France off the hook a little bit there.

Plenty goes on when you play the Italians. They’re reasonably good at keeping the ball. They’re going to give you some interesting kicks

“There’ll be a couple of fix-ups around the breakdown as well but we knew coming into this competition that we would have to keep learning and growing on the move. So, coming away to France is always a big ask but it gives us an opportunity now to look into it in a bit of detail, which lets us attack an Italy side next week.”

Another one of the plusses in hiring Bemand is that he knows the Six Nations in depth from his time with England and, as with France, he’ll have this Irish side prepared for the specific challenges that Italy will bring.

“The Italians bring their own brand,” said Bemand. “Plenty goes on when you play the Italians. They’re reasonably good at keeping the ball. They’re going to give you some interesting kicks, little kicks off Beatrice [Rigoni, centre], little pushes in behind, little chip overs.

“They’ll be a good team. They’ve had a little bit of a rewrite themselves – obviously a newish coaching staff, but they’re a year in, so perhaps they’re slightly more embedded into their playing philosophy than us, but we’re looking forward to welcoming them. We know that we’ve got a game that can give them plenty of problems. We’re looking to fire more sots next week.”

McMahon was not overstating things when she maintained: “It’s a big confidence booster for us.”

“This was our first real test since Dubai to have a crack at World Cup contending squads and we showed that we can contend with them. To fine-tune some of our set piece and our exits and our kick strategy is something we’ll go after, but it gives us a lot of confidence knowing that we’re heading in the right direction.”

Out of little acorns and all that.

SCORING SEQUENCE – 3 mins: Bourdon Sansus try, Queyroi con, 7-0; 14: Fowley pen, 7-3; 32: Marine Ménager try, Queyroi con, 14-3; 38: Queyroi pen, 17-3; (half-time 17-3); 47: Fall try, Queyroi con, 24-3; 62: Sochat try, Queyroi con, 31-3; 71: Wafer try, O’Brien con, 31-10; 75: Riffonneau try, Bourgeois con, 38-10; 77: Dalton try, O’Brien con, 38-17.

FRANCE: Émilie Boulard; Kelly Arbey, Nassira Konde, Gabrielle Vernier, Marine Ménager; Lina Queyroi, Pauline Bourdon Sansus; Annaëlle Deshaye, Agathe Sochat, Assia Khalfaoui; Manaé Feleu (capt), Madoussou Fall; Charlotte Escudero, Gaëlle Hermet, Romane Ménager.

Replacements: Morgane Bourgeois for M Ménager (44 mins); Emeline Gros for Fall (51 mins); Ambre Mwayembe for Deshaye, Alexandra Chambon for Bourdon Sansus (both 61); Elisa Riffonneau for Sochat, Clara Joyeux for Khalfaoui (both 65); Kiara Zago for Feleu (67); Lina Tuy for Queyroi (72).

IRELAND: Lauren Delany (Sale Sharks/IQ Rugby); Katie Corrigan (Old Belvedere/Leinster), Eve Higgins (Railway Union/Leinster), Aoife Dalton (Old Belvedere/Leinster), Béibhinn Parsons (Blackrock College/Connacht); Nicole Fowley (Galwegians/Connacht), Aoibheann Reilly (Blackrock College/Connacht); Linda Djougang (Old Belvedere/Leinster), Neve Jones (Gloucester-Hartpury), Christy Haney (Blackrock College/Leinster); Dorothy Wall (Blackrock College/Munster), Hannah O’Connor (Blackrock College/Leinster); Aoife Wafer (Blackrock College/Leinster), Edel McMahon (Exeter Chiefs) Captain, Brittany Hogan (Old Belvedere /Ulster).

Replacements: Dannah O’Brien (Old Belvedere/Leinster) for Fowley (h-t); Grace Moore (Saracens/IQ Rugby) for McMahon (51 mins); Fiona Tuite (Old Belvedere/Ulster) for Wall (56); Sadhbh McGrath (Cooke/Ulster) for Haney, Molly Scuffil-McCabe (Leinster) for Reilly (both 63), Méabh Deely (Blackrock College/Connacht) for Corrigan (67); Sarah Delaney (Blackrock College/Leinster) for Wafer, Niamh O’Dowd (Old Belvedere/Leinster) for Djougang (both 77).

Referee: Kat Roche (USA).