Player reaction:Asking players to explain the inexplicable, the momentary lapse, the blind spot seems in itself a test of philosophy or theology. Rugby tactics be damned. If you are cursed, you are cursed. When the Irish team sit down and investigate that spleen-twisting, try frame by frame, Eddie O'Sullivan can then begin to point.

But outside the players' changing-room in Croke Park, seeking an explanation from Irish left-wing Denis Hickie is like forcing him to explain why the stars don't fall out of the sky. We are asking him, battered and bruised, and probably still trying to figure it out himself, both the impossible and the obvious. With unerring equanimity, Hickie answers.

"The result was the result and there's not much analysis to be done on that," he says with a touch of regret. "But there's plenty of things to look at in our own performance. If a team travels away from home, you can't let them get that start. You can't let them get settled in like that. That is one thing we are really going to have to stamp out.

"They played smart rugby and in fairness played the territory well. The frustrating thing was we'd to work so hard to get back into the position we had. Doom and gloom now all right and rightfully so.

"We are all disappointed but we've still a match to play in two weeks' time and if we were to win that we'd still be in the Triple Crown and the Championship. We're only in the second round and there are a lot of games to be played."

Hickie will take little from his own performance, which was outstanding, although against the backdrop of the result is probably lost in the moment. He was one of the Irish players who took on the French, played at them without fear and hit them back when bullock and bite were needed. And while the game might be distilled into one maddening moment, the fact that the team took so long to find the required tempo and aggression will be an issue.

"Nothing really was said at half-time," said Hickie. "I just don't think we got into a rhythm in the first half. We were still trying to do what we said going out. We just did it in the second half; tried to speed the game up a bit and wanted to try and take the game a bit more to them. I think we probably stood off them a little too much in the first half, certainly in that first 20 minutes.

"We set our hearts on a Grand Slam," added the winger, "but we've got a big match in two weeks' time. Over the next few days we'll probably take stock of where we are and what we are going to do.

"Obviously we are enormously disappointed but there are positives and I think we can play better as well.

"We tried to take them through phases, which is what you have to do with France," explained Hickie. "They are really strong defensively and you aren't really going to bust them off first phase, or even second phase, so in that respect our second half was more of a success. But it's all been for nothing I'm afraid."

Even for a player, who has been playing at this level for a decade with Leinster and Ireland, the end game took a twist he has not had to endure too often in his career. While the Croke Park experience delivered everything the Irish players had hoped it would (bar the result), it has also set a marker for any other teams travelling to Dublin.

"Definitely, it's tougher to be beaten like that (with a late try) than over the full 80 minutes," he says.

"Luckily I haven't experienced it too many times. You think you've been through it all and them something else comes up. It all happened so quickly I don't really know what happened. A kick-off and they were in the corner and then it was a try. (It) just happened so fast.

"Yeah, the atmosphere was fantastic and I think everyone who was there will be happy they were there. I don't think we gave them very much to cheer about in the first half but any chance we got they (the crowd) really got behind us. It will be really tough for anybody to come here now over the next few years."