Ciarán Frawley’s match-winning drop goal electrified Kings Park, an emotional lightning strike, the explosion of noise a mismatch of sound and vision, the anguished howls of South African supporters at odds with Ireland’s celebrations, the pile-on of green-shirted players reminiscent of Paris, 2018.
On that occasion Johnny Sexton’s drop goal cemented an unlikely victory; this time it was Frawley who settled into the pocket. He was the man; it was the moment. The ball flight dipped and dived like a paper plane set free. In the circumstances there are no extra points for artistic merit. The silken beauty of his first drop goal is the picture to hang on his wall.
Some of Ireland’s great victories have piggybacked on a drop goal – the 2009 Grand Slam won with a sweep of Ronan O’Gara’s right foot – but as a scoring method it has dashed Irish hopes too; 43 years ago in Durban, the iconic Springbok outhalf Naas Botha landed three drop goals as South Africa squeezed home 12-10.
Ireland scored the only try of the game that day, just as they did on Saturday evening but this time the storyline had an upbeat finish. The visitors had the redemptive performance they craved, the bristling aggression and intensity from the opening whistle honouring prematch promises.
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Andy Farrell, sitting before a phalanx of cameras and recorders, gently chided those who had questioned the physical effects of a long season for the players or doubted their ability to cope.
“It can’t be like that, playing for Ireland. If it is, what are we doing? We’ve got to be bigger than that.
“I never get the vibe that they’re just turning up to just muck in and see how they go because they’ve been playing a 13-month season. They don’t see it like that. They go again and keep on playing because that’s how much it means to them.
“You whet the appetite of not just the lads who didn’t play, the lads who are injured but the lads who have ambition to get in the squad. That’s what it’s about, showing them how special it is to put the green jersey on and if we didn’t have that, then we would stop progressing.”
Farrell acknowledged that his team should have been further ahead at the interval.
“It was the sublime to the ridiculous, wasn’t it? It was a complete role reversal of last week. First-half performance was not too great last week; this week, I thought it was outstanding, as good as it gets.
“But second half last week was good, this week we’ve made enough mistakes to lose three games. You just know when you’re hanging in there that there’s always going to be a chance with this team because of the guts, the bravery they’ve got, and they showed that in spades.”
Invariably the conversation zeroed in on the man of the hour.
“He’s [Frawley] been a bit part at 10, a bit part at 15, filling in at 12,” Farrell said. “He deserves the chance to slot in at 10. There was a bit of Jack [Crowley] in him, from the cross-field kick that went out on the full, he [Frawley] could have crumbled there, but his strength was his mental ability to dare to dream.
“To have the character to play the play from the scrum and put the ball through and tackle him [Cheslin Kolbe] into touch, they are scenarios that you go through the whole time in training. You are always trying to give them scenarios, three points down five minutes to go, two points down, one minute to go. It’s nice when they are able to stay composed enough to have the balls to go for it.”
What was Farrell thinking in that final sequence of play? He smiled: “Go one more, get us a little bit closer, but he went early, gave himself room. He knows distance is not a problem. It was ugly, the second one; the first one was beautiful. We will take it.”
He would have loved a decider.
“I don’t get the two-Test series. I’m a traditionalist and I love the three-match series plus a few more [warm-up games]. I heard New Zealand and South Africa are going to do it every four years and I’m jealous of that. That’s proper touring and that’s the tradition of the game and I’m jealous of that.”
In the tunnel James Ryan periodically wipes away the beads of perspiration as he unspools his memories of the game, including his part in the croc-roll that saw Caelan Doris sinbinned.
“I didn’t have any malice in it. It was just awkward the way it ended up. Caelan was a bit unlucky to go off; it could probably have been me.”
But it was the way he summed up what the victory meant to the players, not in an abstract ‘it’s great to win’ type of feeling, but the direct way it will impact immediately.
“It makes a huge difference, even to the next week. When you are in a sport like this, it is all in. We have been on both sides of it. When you get a win like that it makes your summer. It’s not an exaggeration. The ball goes over the bar, [and it’s] just the difference it makes to everyone’s summer. It’s the business we’re in, it’s [winning] like a drug.”
What’s prescribed now is four to five weeks rest, restorative physically. The win in Durban, well that’s the mental tonic.
