Ireland captain Brian O'Driscoll believes concerns over the dangers faced by the emerging nations at the World Cup have proved unfounded.

Former Ireland skipper Keith Wood was among the voices outlining their fears that a player from the tournament minnows could be hurt during a mismatch against a professional team.

But so far the likes of Namibia, Portugal and Georgia have acquitted themselves well with some rousing displays, allaying worries over the number of maulings that would take place in the pool stages.

Ireland face another potentially-hazardous clash against one of Test rugby's developing sides when they meet Georgia in Bordeaux tomorrow night (8pm Irish time).

After struggling to dispatch Namibia last Sunday, O'Driscoll insists the 'Lelos' will not be taken lightly with patience the key to securing another bonus-point victory.

"We thought that the group might have come a bit easier than it did," he said. "But we've seen throughout the whole of this World Cup that everyone has found it difficult in the first 40 or 50 minutes against the perceived minnows.

"England struggled against the United States and even Australia found it tough against Japan in the first half hour. Some of the smaller sides have been impressive.

"You just have to hold your patience and try to wear teams down and in the last 20 minutes take your opportunities when teams open up a bit more.

"You don't win Test matches in 20 minutes no matter who you're playing against - unless you're the All Blacks maybe!"

The pressure for Ireland, Argentina and France to score as freely as possible is intense given Pool D could be decided by points difference.

Against Namibia the Irish were guilty of trying too hard and neglecting the basics in the process, losing sight of the need to gradually grind down the opposition.

Denis Hickie, who trails Leinster colleague O'Driscoll by one in the battle to become Ireland's top try-scorer, insists his side must ignore talk of amassing huge totals against the smaller sides.

"We put ourselves under a bit of pressure against Namibia," said Hickie. "People were making these throw away remarks that this was going to happen or that was going to happen, this will be the score or that will be the score.

"We wanted to do our best in the first game of the tournament and all of this was creeping into our heads. That makes you forget about what you should be doing.

"It was strange because we were winning the game by 20 points, yet were still chasing it. That dictated the performance because we kept thinking we should be up my more.

"Australia's performance is something we should have emulated. Even at half-time they weren't up by that much.

"They didn't panic, just kept plugging at it. We just got worse.

"If we cut out the individual errors then we will go a long way to getting back to where we were - that's what we must focus on against Georgia."