Gritty Irish ready to rattle England
The green machine will head to London on a high following defeat of Wales
STORM Ciara stayed away but Ireland built a big green wall to barricade t hemselves against Welsh tides in Dublin and beat the Grand Slam champions.
Andy Farrell’s side went in front, then defended for their lives and sniped for scores as Wales lost in the Six Nations for the first time in nine games.
It was their previous trip here in the championship when Wales were last beaten — this was not the 37-27 see-saw match of 2018, but was all grit, determination and resolve.
After a year of faltering, Irish captain Johnny Sexton felt fantastic after yesterday’s win.
Asked if he enjoyed it, the No10 said: ‘Yes, it wouldn’t be hard after last year. It was brilliant. It had a bit of everything.’
And Farrell added: ‘ It was an improved performance. I thought we were excellent, we were on the front foot in defence and attack.’
It was Jordan Larmour who sprinkled t he stardust with a first-half opening try, then Tadhg Furlong smashed over for a second after Tomos Williams’ dart for Wales.
Josh van der Flier rumbled within a maul for his try and Andrew Conway had the bonus-point score with five minutes left.
And aside from Justin Tipuric’s consolation try that was that — Wales were wasteful when they laid siege to the Irish line and the green machine held strong to remain unbeaten with England up next at Twickenham.
Ruing Welsh profligacy afterwards, Wayne Pivac — having suffered his first defeat as coach — said: ‘We came up against a side that were desperate to win the match, as we were.
‘We were inaccurate in a lot of our play. When we did get into the areas of the field we wanted to, we weren’t accurate and let the Irish off the hook. When they got down the other end, they made us pay.’
The early exchanges saw CJ Stander and Tipuric engaged in a full- blooded breakdown battle. Ireland kept things close and found openings in Wales’ narrow defence, while the visitors tried, and failed, to play wide.
For their first try Ireland slowly went through their short-punching drives in the Welsh 22. They crept along almost to a standstill until Conor Murray fizzed a ball right to the hot-stepping Larmour, who led Wales into an Irish jig. Seeing Nick Tompkins, making his first start, unbalanced, the full-back nipped inside the Welsh centre and found a vital pocket of space. Then there was nothing that anyone could do to stop the 22-year-old from scoring a fine try.
Sexton then shanked the conversion which meant when Williams scored and Dan Biggar converted, the visitors had the lead.
The score was sublime. In his 136th Welsh Test, 14th Six Nations, and at 34-years old Alun Wyn Jones is still standard-bearing. Here the Wales captain took a pass from Biggar, rode a tackle and popped to his fly-half inside which sent the No10 in behind. Biggar then found Williams tracking inside and fed him for the try. The TMO checked whether Jones’ pass was forward — it was not and the old dog’s new trick counted.
Williams went from hero to zero though. At the other end, minutes later, he dropped a hand-me-down from Jones at the lineout right on his line inexplicably.
I t was t he most gl ari ng of a number of handling errors from Wales.
With the scrum five out, Ireland then went left after a couple of phases to Furlong who went over. Sexton hit the conversion.
What made things worse for Wales is that the sensationally in-form Josh Adams had limped off with a hip i njury so they were shorn of their most potent attacking weapon. Added to that, Tompkins was not having a day like last week. It all seemed so easy when he was rounding Italians on home debut, but in the Irish cauldron he started to struggle with dropped passes and average defensive reads.
Ken Owens’ lineouts were picked off too and, with the second bad dart, the Irish went rumbling. A penalty for offside in midfield after the stolen set- piece and Ireland kicked to the corner, almost running the maul over the line. Van der Flier looked to have grounded short, but it was given. Sexton converted.
Biggar then went off for Jarrod Evans — a late replacement for Owen Williams who injured his hamstring in the warm-up — and suddenly Wales found more zip.
Taulupe Faletau, Dillon Lewis and Jake Ball carried well and when Hadleigh Parkes came whacking through he thought he had scored, but a TMO look showed he had dropped it over the line. ‘It was a big decision, but the decision was right,’ said Pivac. ‘With 20 minutes to go, it’s game on at that point if it’s scored.’
In their final struggles for a sensational revival, Welsh hopes died when George North dropped a simple pass on his wing to sum up a profligate performance.
Conway made him pay, catching and scoring in the opposite corner to make it a fourth consecutive home win for the Irish against Wales in the Six Nations.
Stander was sin-binned late on and Tipuric scored a consolation but Irish foundations by t hat point had been well- laid for a championship challenge.