Brian O'Driscoll's Diary It wasn't a huge issue, but yes, I knew I'd equalled the try-scoring record of another centre, Brenny Mullin. I think it would be ignorant of me not to have known that. Obviously it is a great honour to draw level with Brenny. I thought he was a fantastic player for Ireland throughout the 1980s and the 1990s.

Yeah, it is great for Blackrock, club and school. Brenny was a great player for Blackrock, Ireland and the Lions.

Club rugby, not provincial, was where it was at when he played. Sure, I think it is great having two ex-pupils holding a record with the same number of tries for their country.

Don't get me wrong, though. Of course I'd love to break the record. But I think you've got to let these things happen naturally and not try to force it or push it too hard. I've got myself into a situation now where I only need one more, but if you look at list of current players, you've Maggsy scoring three today which takes him up to 12 or 13. Denis Hickie is on 14 and Woody is on 14 or 15. So any of them have the ability to go on and break Brenny's record before I do.

It's not an issue with anyone.

My feeling is that if the tries come then that is fantastic, but today they came three fold for Kevin (Maggs) and twice for Geordan. I was just as pleased with those tries. You really get more satisfaction out of a team scoring than an individual try.

In terms of the match itself, I think there was an important element of value. Obviously Fiji are sevens specialists and perhaps not as good in the 15-man game. But there was a certain amount of pressure put on us to go out and perform and get a good victory, especially having beaten Australia last week. I think we did that. But you know, you still have to score your tries against these teams, you still have to break them down, and they were big hitters.

I thought we worked well to our pattern, had the right attitude by giving them maximum respect just as if they were world champions themselves, and the end result was we scored nine tries.

The satisfying thing about the set pieces working is that all the hard work we do on the training ground comes off. That must also feel great for Eddie, Niall and Declan, whose job is to see what moves can break down defences. When some of the moves come off they should be as pleased as the players.

That is were you derive a lot of pleasure - when things come off after you've practised them hard time and time again. You practise to do these things and sometimes it doesn't work because out on the pitch you have to play what you see in front of you. But when they come off, you view it as a job well done.

AT HALF-TIME, okay, we'd scored 39 points, but we just said that we had to show full respect for a side like this, pretend it's nil all and try to do the exact same all over again. If you can put 39 points on a team without losing focus then the potential is there to do the same again in the second half. What we said was to go out and not lose our shape and not play sevens. But try and score more tries and aim to be ruthless.

We still played percentages, kicked to the corners and didn't attempt to run from our own goal line. I think in the end we were ruthless enough.

If you are giving a side sympathy, you are not giving them the respect they deserve and I believe the ultimate respect you can give to them is continuing to play against them as hard as you possibly can.

If I was in Fiji's predicament, and the team we were playing purposely took their foot off the pedal to ease the scoreline, I'd feel disgusted. Rugby is about going out and playing your best for as long as the referee decides.

Now I'm looking forward to Argentina. I enjoyed the captaincy a lot more this week. It was a novelty to me last week, probably a little harder this time, because while you know nobody will find it difficult getting up for a game against the world champions, media hype has it that we will come out comfortable winners.

I suppose you have to be aware that there cannot be an air of complacency and that's the way we acted this week. I didn't have to tell anyone that. Total professionalism.

The coaching staff is looking at the World Cup next year and the Six Nations in February. At this early stage of the season, everyone is trying to stake their claim.