STAND-IN IRELAND COACH Les Kiss was content with his side’s 12-15 victory over USA in Houston last night.
The backs coach, who will continue working under Joe Schmidt after next week’s second Test in Canada, said he was pleased with the manner in which his young side dealt with the pressure brought on by the ever-improving hosts.
“The USA were very physical and it’s exactly what we expected. We believed we could lay a platform with our scrum, tonight it served us well and got us a lot of points,” said Kiss.
“I thought we managed the pressure well when it came on us and always stayed in control of the game.”
In all, five players earned their first international cap for Ireland with Ian Madigan and Dave Kilcoyne starting for the first time. With that in mind, Kiss stressed the importance of an away Test victory for the inexperienced squad members. Even if the performance (albeit under the eye of a poor refereeing display) and result left much room for improvement.
“It is an away from home Test win,” Kiss told the BBC. “I am thrilled to bits for the boys who won their first caps that the rest of the boys got the win on such a special day.
“”The overall thing is we got a win away from home, it was a tough game and we expected nothing less.
“The USA have really improved over the last 12 to 18 months, they have been really pushing on.
“It was tough out there, the conditions were tough and the ball was really slippy.”
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