IRELAND CAPTAIN Rory Best has challenged his team to show their character and find the right response to last night’s humbling home defeat to England, rather than let it knock them completely off track in a World Cup year.
Ireland’s hopes of back-to-back Grand Slam titles were emphatically dashed on Saturday evening as England bullied the hosts into submission at the Aviva Stadium, recording a statement victory on the opening weekend of the 2019 Six Nations.
Best dejected at full-time. Billy Stickland / INPHO
Billy Stickland / INPHO / INPHO
It brought Ireland’s 12-game unbeaten run to a shuddering halt, while the 32-20 reversal was the first home defeat in the Six Nations during Schmidt’s six years in charge and only the second time Ireland have conceded more than 30 points in a Test match under the Kiwi.
Saturday night served as a reality check for Schmidt’s side as they were dominated in all facets by an England outfit that showed impressive aggression, intelligence and execution to record their biggest win in Dublin in 15 years.
Advertisement
Eddie Jones’ side won the aerial and physical battle hands down, while their aggressive linespeed in defence prevented Ireland from getting any sort of stranglehold in the game, as the 50,000 in attendance were left stunned.
England started with intent and hit the front inside the opening two minutes through Jonny May, before clinching the bonus-point win through further scores from Elliot Daly and a second-half Henry Slade brace.
“The disappointing thing for us is the way we started,” Best conceded. “When you play internationals away from home especially, you want to get a foothold in the game and we let England get that and we didn’t ever get back on the front foot.
“I don’t think we necessarily need wake up calls to want to improve, we’ll look at this and we’ll look at the ways we can get better and we have to get better but we prepared well and prepared to go out and win a game and we’ll have to look this week at how we can make sure whatever happened with our detail, we just didn’t get the physical edge that we’re used to having.”
With back-to-back away games to come in the championship, starting with Scotland at Murrayfield next Saturday, Ireland have a mountain to climb if they are to retain their Six Nations crown in 2019.
Having built up huge momentum and confidence throughout a brilliant season last year, Best says it’s now up to the squad to show their character in the face of adversity and disappointment and ensure this was a blip, and nothing more.
It was a tough night for Ireland at the Aviva. James Crombie / INPHO
James Crombie / INPHO / INPHO
“We’ve talked a lot about the character of this squad and that sort of character coming off the back of putting wins together, well we’ll see a lot about them next week,” the hooker continued.
“I’ve no doubt we’ll respond, we’ll have to just take this on the chin. We were bettered by England in all facets of the game. We’ll get some harsh and constructive feedback. We know we’ll need to be better next week, right across the board. It’ll be a huge test for us at Murrayfield.
“When we were putting wins together, we were never getting ahead of ourselves because we were never the finished article. We wanted to be better and this is no different now. How we respond will determine if it’s a bump in the road or something more than that but I know, with the group of players we have, they’re hurting in there. The first thing we’ll do is look at how we can get better. We can’t change the result but we can change how we react to it.”
Schmidt concluded: “We’ve got to keep learning, and sometimes people forget the youth of these guys. Those guys will keep learning and we’ve got to challenge them to keep getting better. That will be a challenge to all our confidence, that result tonight, because you get used to that winning feeling and it’s pretty hollow right now.”
Subscribe to our new podcast, The42 Rugby Weekly, here:
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Close
58 Comments
This is YOUR comments community. Stay civil, stay constructive, stay on topic.
Please familiarise yourself with our comments policy
here
before taking part.
'A challenge to all our confidence because you get used to that winning feeling'
Ryan Bailey reports from the Aviva Stadium
IRELAND CAPTAIN Rory Best has challenged his team to show their character and find the right response to last night’s humbling home defeat to England, rather than let it knock them completely off track in a World Cup year.
Ireland’s hopes of back-to-back Grand Slam titles were emphatically dashed on Saturday evening as England bullied the hosts into submission at the Aviva Stadium, recording a statement victory on the opening weekend of the 2019 Six Nations.
It brought Ireland’s 12-game unbeaten run to a shuddering halt, while the 32-20 reversal was the first home defeat in the Six Nations during Schmidt’s six years in charge and only the second time Ireland have conceded more than 30 points in a Test match under the Kiwi.
Saturday night served as a reality check for Schmidt’s side as they were dominated in all facets by an England outfit that showed impressive aggression, intelligence and execution to record their biggest win in Dublin in 15 years.
Eddie Jones’ side won the aerial and physical battle hands down, while their aggressive linespeed in defence prevented Ireland from getting any sort of stranglehold in the game, as the 50,000 in attendance were left stunned.
England started with intent and hit the front inside the opening two minutes through Jonny May, before clinching the bonus-point win through further scores from Elliot Daly and a second-half Henry Slade brace.
“The disappointing thing for us is the way we started,” Best conceded. “When you play internationals away from home especially, you want to get a foothold in the game and we let England get that and we didn’t ever get back on the front foot.
“I don’t think we necessarily need wake up calls to want to improve, we’ll look at this and we’ll look at the ways we can get better and we have to get better but we prepared well and prepared to go out and win a game and we’ll have to look this week at how we can make sure whatever happened with our detail, we just didn’t get the physical edge that we’re used to having.”
With back-to-back away games to come in the championship, starting with Scotland at Murrayfield next Saturday, Ireland have a mountain to climb if they are to retain their Six Nations crown in 2019.
Having built up huge momentum and confidence throughout a brilliant season last year, Best says it’s now up to the squad to show their character in the face of adversity and disappointment and ensure this was a blip, and nothing more.
“We’ve talked a lot about the character of this squad and that sort of character coming off the back of putting wins together, well we’ll see a lot about them next week,” the hooker continued.
“I’ve no doubt we’ll respond, we’ll have to just take this on the chin. We were bettered by England in all facets of the game. We’ll get some harsh and constructive feedback. We know we’ll need to be better next week, right across the board. It’ll be a huge test for us at Murrayfield.
“When we were putting wins together, we were never getting ahead of ourselves because we were never the finished article. We wanted to be better and this is no different now. How we respond will determine if it’s a bump in the road or something more than that but I know, with the group of players we have, they’re hurting in there. The first thing we’ll do is look at how we can get better. We can’t change the result but we can change how we react to it.”
Schmidt concluded: “We’ve got to keep learning, and sometimes people forget the youth of these guys. Those guys will keep learning and we’ve got to challenge them to keep getting better. That will be a challenge to all our confidence, that result tonight, because you get used to that winning feeling and it’s pretty hollow right now.”
Subscribe to our new podcast, The42 Rugby Weekly, here:
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
back down to earth bump in the road Six Nations Ireland England