THE FIRST WIN of James Ryan’s Ireland captaincy rung more than a little hollow.

A Tier two opponent and a two-tiered performance from Ireland that lapsed from promising but stuttering to unacceptable as Ireland took a 20-7 half-time lead over Georgia and turned it into a 23-10 win.

Eight days on from efforts to mine positivity out of another thorough defeat at English hands, Ireland’s coach and senior players were considering harsh realities.

Nominated man of the match Iain Henderson was the first put in front of the cameras to set the tone of the appraisals and the kindest approach he could take was that Ireland created chances. Chances that were left untaken either through TMO review or more often an absence of a clinical edge in the face of blunt-force Georgian pressure.

Next week’s final Test of the Autumn series is understandably high in the consideration of Ryan and Ireland’s players. A six-day turnaround to Scotland is a blessing and a curse for a squad with injuries, but also a need to swiftly move back into gear against a team who they can consider on an equal footing.

“It’s not like we don’t know what to fix, they’re all fixable issues. today the ruck… we know ourselves what’s wrong. So that’s great for us.

“There’s so much to work on. There’s an opportunity to end the year on a high.

I’ve no doubt we’re going in the right direction. We know how to fix things and it’s very much in our hands.”

The skipper added:

“It’s not the standard it should be. We’ll have to take a hard look at ourselves tonight and tomorrow. Because if we ant to finish the year on a positive note next week we’ll have to be a lot better than that.”