POOL C Ireland 22 USA 10:IRELAND GOT their win, if not quite the commanding performance and result they would have wanted a week before facing Australia. Specifically, a fourth try and a bonus point eluded them throughout the fourth quarter, which was symptomatic of the many chances they squandered on a mucky, muddled night in New Plymouth.
To compound this, they coughed up an intercept try in the final play of the game, which revived uncomfortable memories of the intercept try they conceded when failing to obtain a bonus point against Georgia in their second pool game in Bordeaux.
The winning margin was also less than in the opening 32-17 win against Namibia four years ago, when Ireland at least did procure a bonus point in the final quarter.
This wasn’t as bad as those performances, for unlike the Georgian game Ireland never, ever looked losing this one, and to a large degree they were undone by a combination of a sodden, windy night in coastal New Plymouth, as well as a predictably fired-up and ultra-physical USA team.
Even so, you’d imagine the sense of anti-climax would have been greater in the winning dressingroom. On a night like this strong, solid set-pieces are even more imperative.
Ireland had that and more, their scrum predictably highlighting the Eagles’ Achilles’ heel by regularly steamrollering them, and while it yielded a few penalties and the important if belated breakthrough try on half-time, Ireland failed to fully maximise this advantage.
Their hard-working maul also trundled forward regularly, and it too led to one of Ireland’s two second-half tries when Rory Best peeled away to break the tackles of Todd Clever, the first and only time on the night when anyone managed that feat against the ubiquitous Eagles openside and captain.
But given such set-piece forward superiority, Ireland might have made more of this.
In their game management, often kicking poorly and needlessly, they didn’t adapt to the opposition and conditions or to opponents who scarcely had a set-piece. Nor, as expected, could the Americans kick their way out of trouble, relying almost exclusively in this regard on the effective box kicking of Mike Petri.
It didn’t help that Conor Murray, though he looks a very good player in the making, had a mixed game. He had some classy touches, ran hard and physically, and often moved the ball away quickly when he could. But, as befits someone with his lack of experience, some of his decision-making was awry, and he sometimes kicked poorly.
It also didn’t help that he had to excavate for the ball, for Ireland’s work at the breakdown remains inaccurate. This all filtered through to Jonny Sexton who, on top of this, had his goal-kicking issues gnawing away at him.
Some of his general play was good, but some of it was wayward too, such as loose kicks, and he seemed to have problems with footing when kicking off the tee or from his hands.
Paul O’Connell and the tight five worked like Trojans, and Best had a generally good night, while Stephen Ferris was a willing carrier, whether showing up close in or as a midfield target runner.
But Shane Jennings would surely like to have made more impact at the breakdown, where Clever was a constant thorn, and behind such a dominant scrum, especially as Jamie Heaslip was again curiously quiet.
Inevitably, Ireland sorely missed the ball-carrying of Seán O’Brien.
Clever lived up to his name by cleaving plenty of men in green, and supplemented the USA’s midfield defence.
Whenever the rain relented Ireland looked for quick lineout ball or, toward the end, quick scrum ball as they searched for their fourth try.
But they rarely made inroads, though there was one try-scoring backs move off a scrum on the hour (at which point the snappier Eoin Reddan and Ronan O’Gara had arrived), when Bowe found a hole in the defensive line after the rare use of a decoy runner in Ferris to fix the defence. Bowe might have backed himself further before exchanging passes with Brian O’Driscoll to register his second try.
Bowe scored his first off a deft inside flick by Sexton when running one of his infield trailers, and indeed both of his tries came from another relative rarity – passes inside. The first of Ireland’s only three clean line breaks also employed Keith Earls up the middle. Quite why Ireland don’t do more of this, and make more use of their back three – all of whom run good trailers – remains a bit of a mystery.
Even then Ireland left an awful lot of points behind. While there may be issues with the Gilbert ball when you think of how so many kickers have struggled, a return of two from six lengthy but kickable penalties failed to get the scoreboard ticking and gave the Americans every encouragement to keep making their tackles.
On top of failing to convert Earls’ early line break, Ireland failed to score off severable close-range set-pieces – as when launching Tom Court off the tail with a clever variation in the first-half, or losing control of a scrum when they were one more shove away from a try or penalty try.
In between, twice in quick succession they butchered a try, first when Bowe failed to take Gordon D’Arcy’s reverse pass (his third knock-on of the first-half), then when Best’s offload dropped to the feet of Earls and he was adjudged to have fumbled before scoring.
Along with the kicks, had even one or two of these opportunities been taken Ireland would have emerged from a proverbial banana skin with a five-point haul.
Interpretations of this performance might also have altered and, more importantly, they’d have moved on to Auckland in a more confident frame of mind.
A win’s a win, but little of that applies now.
Scoring sequence: 16 mins: Sexton pen 3-0; 40: Bowe try, Sexton con 10-0; (half-time 10-0); 54: Patterson pen 10-3; 57: Best try 15-3; 60: Bowe try, O'Gara con 22-3; 80: Emerick try, Malifa con 22-10.
IRELAND: G Murphy (Leicester); T Bowe (Ospreys), B O'Driscoll (Leinster, capt), G D'Arcy (Leinster), K Earls (Munster); J Sexton (Leinster), C Murray (Munster); T Court (Ulster), R Best (Ulster), M Ross (Leinster); D O'Callaghan (Munster), P O'Connell (Munster); S Ferris (Ulster), S Jennings (Leinster), J Heaslip (Leinster). Replacements: E Reddan (Leinster) for Murray, R O'Gara (Munster) for Sexton (both 51 mins), J Flannery (Munster) for Best, D Leamy (Munster) for Jennings (both 60 mins), T Buckley (Sale Sharks) for Court (65 mins), A Trimble (Ulster) for Murphy (67 mins). Not used: D Ryan (Munster).
USA: B Scully (Unattached); T Ngwenya (Biarritz), P Emerick (Life University), A Suniula (Chicago Griffins), J Paterson (Highlanders); R Suniula (Boston), M Petri (New York Athletic Club); M MacDonald (Leeds Carnegie), P Thiel (Life University), S Pittman (London Welsh); J van der Giessen (Unattached), H Smith (Saracens); L Stanfill (Unattached), T Clever (Suntory Sungoliath, capt), N Johnson (Unattached). Replacements: N Malifa (Glendale) for R Suniula (59 mins), M Moeakiola (Bobigny 93) for Pittman (63 mins), T Usasz (Nottingham) for Petri (67 mins), C Biller (San Francisco Golden Gate) for Thiel (68 mins). Not used: S LaValla (Stade Français), P Danahy (Life University), C Hawley (Olympic Club).
Referee: C Joubert(South Africa).
