IN THE END, it was a thrashing at the hands of Ireland for Georgia, but Joe Schmidt’s side made heavy work of the tier two nation for 40 minutes.
Here’s a few numbers from yesterday’s game to mull over before Schmidt makes his changes for the years final Test against the Wallabies.
Owning the ball
After winning the game without the ball last week, Ireland enjoyed 64% possession yesterday with 70% of the game played in the opposition half.
Aiding those stats was Ireland’s increased passing rate – from 83 last week to 186 yesterday – and 24 clean breaks. Ireland also got off the mark in terms of offloads, last week’s zero replaced by nine against Georgia.
O’Donnell and the defence
Despite Georgia only having 35 and 37% possession in respective halves, Ireland still managed to clock up 100 tackles in the game.
That century was shared out evenly enough across the field, but openside Tommy O’Donnell was top of the pile with 11.
Richardt Strauss was next best in the pack with nine while Ian Madigan was in the firing line, forced into making 10 tackles in the out-half channel.
Gilroy gains
Madigan also ran the ball more than any other player, the number 10 opting to test the line 13 times and profiting with 77 metres.
Ulster wing Craig Gilroy was Ireland’s top carrier in the loose with 85 metres gained off 12 carries. Felix Jones ran 68 in 12 and Simon Zebo 59 in nine.
7/11
In the pack, the hard yards were gained by Tommy O’Donnell. Along with his 11 tackles, he also made 11 carries for a gain of 24 metres.
Dave Kilcoyne’s first half line-break helped him rack up 46 metres on seven carries. Robbie Diack looked comfortable taking the ball in to contact and his 10 carries earned 34 metres. Blindside Dominic Ryan made 19 metres off eight carries and man of the match Dave Foley gained 17 metres with 10 carries.
Foley’s line-out
Along with an impressive tally of carries from Foley and Diack, the pair also dominated the line-out. The Munster man was handed the reins in Paul O’Connell’s absence and he took plenty of responsibility on himself, claiming seven throws – a figure matched by Diack.
The remaining five of the 19 successful Irish line-outs (20 in total) went to Mike McCarthy (3), Dominic Ryan and Devin Toner (one each).
