THE TITANIC EFFORT of the Irish World Cup team are being fêted at home and abroad this week, but was the performance against Australia quite all that it could, or perhaps should, have been?
As intoxicating as it was to see an Irish scrum and lineout dominate, naysayers remain free to claim the pack’s wild success only masked failings in a number of other departments.
Where, for example, were the tries?
The running in the centre channels looked sharper and more threatening, alright, but failed to yield a decisive breakthrough.
As it is, you’d be crazy to criticise the team’s performance against the Aussies; what we want to know is: