Awful Irish hang on
10 Mar 2007
Ireland clinched the Triple Crown with an unconvincing 19-18 win against Scotland at Murrayfield.
It is Ireland’s second consecutive clean sweep of the home unions, and provides some consolation after their failure to clinch the Grand Slam. It also keeps alive their slim hopes of winning the Six Nations title depending on what happens at Twickenham on Sunday.
After the euphoria of their 43-13 victory against England at Croke Park, Ireland produced their worst performance of the season at Murrayfield.
Six penalties by Chris Paterson gave Scotland a shock 18-13 lead with 15 minutes to go before Ronan O’Gara’s boot edged the visitors back in front.
It was O’Gara who scored the only try of the match on the 30-minute mark. Scottish flyhalf Dan Parks tried to clear from inside his 22, but saw his kick charged down by the Irish No 10. Gordon D’Arcy and Simon Easterby carried the ball up, before feeding O’Gara who dived over for the try and then slotted the conversion.
Scotland – Penalties: Chris Paterson (6).
Ireland – Try: Ronan O’Gara. Conversion: O’Gara. Penalties: O’Gara (4).
4 Comments
10 Mar 2007, 18:29 pm
Have to agree from an Irish perspective that was very unprofessional.
The mood in Ireland has been a bit “so what” with regard to the Triple Crown. If the other nations were any good it would be more special. Better than not winning anything, but nowhere near world beaters. And they are capable of beating any team in the world if they play to their ability.
I think they were severely under-motivated and today would only have been a success if they had put 40 points on a poor Scotland team. SA would have along with its neighbours to the east.
Ruthlessness is something that this side needs to learn.
Having said that the Scottish should have been playing yellow card bingo for persistent infringements.
No complaints really though other than Ireland were pants today and are much better than that.
10 Mar 2007, 19:20 pm
Irish will come unstuck bigtime at the World cup if they play like that.
Sctoland let that game go, what a stupid kick, the oak thought he was in hi school and no one was going to run at him
11 Mar 2007, 10:02 am
A bad day at the office or the first crack in the Irish dream?
I think we’ll only know once the WC gets under way.
11 Mar 2007, 17:17 pm
The Irish were really lucky.
The quick line out taken by Ireland that was thrown 2 meters back to avoid the Scotish player that was actually standing at the line out. What absolute bollocks. Not sure about the half back diving in on his knees to play tunnel ball. Where was the ref from?
Have your say
You must be logged in to post a comment.