THIS IRELAND TEAM have set the bar so high that we’re now at the point where bonus-point Six Nations wins can feel somewhat unsatisfactory.
The asterisk on today’s 31-7 defeat of Wales is that the visitors are not the force of old. This is a young, inexperienced Wales team and while they offered little in attack at Aviva Stadium, they fought hard to protect their own tryline and frustrate an Irish attack which scythed through France and Italy so impressively across their opening two bonus-point wins.
Yet here they stagnated slightly, the moments of attacking brilliance and forward dominance complemented by long stretches where things just didn’t quite click, most notably across the scrappy period in the second half where Wales briefly threatened to make life awkward for their hosts.
Yet in the end Ireland responded impressively, Ciarán Frawley’s pressure-easing try and Tadhg Beirne’s late bonus-point score adding some gloss to the scoreboard, after efforts from Dan Sheehan and James Lowe had put Ireland in the ascendancy before half-time.
This wasn’t the prettiest bonus-point win Ireland have recorded under Farrell’s watch but his team still found a way to take maximum points against a stubborn Welsh side, ensuring their drive to become the first team to win back-to-back Grand Slams in the Six Nations era remains on course.
“If you fast-forward right to the end result and then work our way back, I thought we was tenacious to be able to get to that point, a 31-7 win with a bonus-point,” said Farrell.
“There was all sorts of stuff going on in that game, some of it was our own doing but most of it was because we played against a tenacious Welsh side as well, so congratulations to them, but we stuck at it and brought them down in the end.
“For the dominance that we had in the scrum in the first half, I felt we could have had a bit of a better lead going into half-time. But having said that coming out in the second half I thought we were in the right place, but it was penalties all over the place and it was a bit stop-start, but we found our way again and found a way to get back going and get the result we were after.”
“We knew that we can have a bit more intent and a bit more accuracy but at the same time credit to them,” added Ireland captain Peter O’Mahony.
“I thought they defended and tackled well and some of their chop tackling was good. We’ve been the other side of that card with Ireland – I certainly have – going in as underdogs and it’s a nice place to be. You can get stuck in and I thought they certainly did that.
There was times when they put us under pressure and times when we could have turned the screw with our attack but they were good defensively.”
Just before Farrell had entered the press conference room, Warren Gatland had held court, telling his audience that he felt the 31-7 scoreline wasn’t reflective of the 80-minute shift his team had put in.
“It probably should have been 40 or 44-7, there were a couple of tries that were notched off there,” was Farrell’s response to the same question.
“I thought we got what we deserved in the end. If the forward pass from Robbie [Henshaw] hadn’t have been knocked off I thought that was going to be an unbelievable try, and again, it was finding a way to make inroads.
“I actually thought they defended really well at times. It was hard to break down but to get the bonus-point win, 31-7, I thought we should have been further up in the first half to be fair, but I do understand that this is a young Welsh side that’s trying to gain experience as well, and I thought they played bloody tough, that’s for sure.”
Ireland now enter another break week before taking on England in Twickenham on 9 March.
Farrell will hope to have Hugo Keenan back after the fullback missed today’s clash with a knee injury, while there appears to be no fresh injury concerns from today’s game, with Josh van der Flier passing his HIA after being substituted in the second half.
