Our rugby writer, Mike O’Halloran, says Ireland can expect France to bring their A game for the next match…
EVEN the loss of Sean O Brien just before kick off wasn’t enough to prevent the expected opening win for Ireland over Italy in the Six Nations.
O’Brien twinged his hamstring in the warm-up and was replaced by Tommy O’Donnell who went on to take the opportunity to start with both hands.
The game panned out as expected with Italy bringing their physicality to the table, stifling any attempt by Ireland to go wide and keeping it tight.
The Irish pack took charge of the game from early on and rucked and mauled the Italians into submission.
Ireland escaped what was a potential banana skin in Rome with two tries and points on the table, but in a championship that could come down to tries for at the end of the competition two tries against the weakest team might not be enough.
The other teams in the competition will target the Italian games to raise their numbers in the tries for column and one would expect that there could be a try fest for England when Italy visit Twickenham next weekend.
The fact that Scotland did not concede a try to France in Paris might help Ireland’s cause on that score.
Italy lacked any imagination behind the scrum and the conversion of the ex Kiwi centre Haimona to number ten did not work out, this was further exposed when Haimona moved to centre and young Tommaso Allan took over at out half late in the second half and was able to get his backs into the game especially the Sale Sharks full back Luke McLean who played on the wing today.
As for Irelan, it will take a massive improvement next weekend when the visitors to The Aviva Stadium in Dublin are France.
As usual there will be talk of which French team turns up, I’m sure France will show up with their A game given that this is a World Cup year, France will attempt to build momentum for the game in the World Cup versus Ireland in Cardiff in October (a game I was lucky enough to get tickets for) with a victory.
There is great confidence in the current group of players and even more confidence in their coach, who is regarded by all the pundits as one of the top coaches in the world.
Lets hope that confidence is enough to at least see Ireland past a sometimes brittle French team to set up a cracker on March 1 against the Charioteers also at the Aviva Stadium.
The return of Jamie Heaslip and Jonathan Sexton should increase the chances of a home win but given the fright that Scotland gave France yesterday and their need to set down a marker for the World Cup, expect a huge challenge from France.
