France wins Six Nations after Ireland lose
By Stuart Condie, 21 Mar 2010 Stuart Condie is a Roar Rookie
- Tagged:
- France, Ireland, Rugby Union, Six Nations
France won the Six Nations even before playing Saturday’s final match of the tournament after defending champions Ireland slumped to a surprise loss to Scotland.
Ireland needed to beat Scotland by a healthy margin at Croke Park to have any chance of overhauling France at the top of the standings, but were unable to capitalise on large amounts of possession and territory.
Ireland fought back from 17-10 down to twice level the scores but Dan Parks kicked his fifth penalty with two minutes left to give Scotland a 23-20 victory.
Defeat left Ireland with six points and three wins from five matches, two points fewer than France, who will try to win their first Grand Slam of victories since 2004 against England later on Saturday.
Scotland finished in fifth place, above only Italy.
Ireland outscored Scotland by two tries to one and threw the ball around as though it was a sevens match, but handling errors and infringements at the breakdown gave Parks the openings to help clinch a third man-of-the-match award in five games.
Ireland flyhalf Jonathan Sexton missed two penalties in a kicking display as erratic as the one he mustered against Wales last week and was eventually replaced by Ronan O’Gara.
Sexton did set up Brian O’Driscoll for his first try of the 2010 tournament to put Ireland ahead but John Beattie, aided by some weak Irish defence, touched down to help the visitors to a 14-7 halftime lead.
Wing Tommy Bowe then rounded off a slick passing move midway through the second half with his third try of the competition and O’Gara tied the scores at 17-17 and then 20-20.
But infringements at the scrum and breakdown continued to wear on referee Jonathan Kaplan and he gave Parks the penalty way out on the left to kick Scotland to victory.
“We got a bit of luck at the end of the game but Dan landed a great kick,” Scotland coach Andy Robinson said. “The guys are hurting, they are tired but they deserve the plaudits for this win.”
The victory means that Scotland, who lost to Wales on the last move of the match and were unlucky to draw 15-15 with England last week, avoids the ignominy of the wooden spoon for finishing last.
That position went to Italy for the fifth time in six years after they lost 33-10 at Wales.
The Welsh finished fourth for a second straight year after winning for only the second time.
“It’s been pretty frustrating,” Wales coach Warren Gatland said. “I felt we haven’t performed to our potential. There’s a couple of games we’ve let slip.
“We don’t feel the table really reflects where we are. On our day, if we get things right and working, we can trouble any side in the world.”
Centre James Hook touched down twice against an increasingly ill-disciplined Italian side and winger Shane Williams got a late try while flyhalf Stephen Jones finished with 18 points in a flawless kicking performance.
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Dublin Dave said | March 21st 2010 @ 9:14pm | Report comment
Ireland played like a bunch of Englishmen, and were deservedly beaten.
This is not meant to be another gratuitous anti-English diatribe, even though such an approach usually plays rather well to a southern-hemisphere gallery. What I mean is that Ireland committed the same error that England often repeat when they come up as favourites against a determined underdog. They reckon the match is won before a ball is kicked, that they only have to show up to win, that they can patronise and belittle the opposition and behave as if they’re on a training park, and that their superior command of the finer skills of the game will see them home without breaking sweat.
So many Irish (and other Celtic nations’) wins against England have been assisted by this attitude. Yesterday, the glass slipper got transferred on to an Irish foot where it was promptly stood upon and shattered by a rampant Scottish pack.
Ireland began the game as if it were a sevens match, flipping the ball around at every opportunity running crazy angles and pretending to be the Harlem Globetrotters. Only they’re not. They have the same tendency to pass to the knees, knock on, fumble and fall over as Irish backs have had since time immemorial. They did fashion one brilliantly inventive try from a nice loop move (albeit with a final forward pass of which an NFL quarterback would have been proud) but more often than not, their effors resulted in a Scottish scrum.
By the time Ireland realised that they needed to get the basics right it was too late. Scotland had started with just that mindset and kept it up for 80 minutes: win your scrums and lineouts and kick your goals. Ireland could do none of those three things. They always knew they would struggle against the Scottish scrum, but they probably figured they could hold their own in the lineout. A combination of a bad day throwing in by Rory Best and an aggressive Scottish pack overturned that notion. Ireland struggled all day at the lineout.
They still had enough territorial presence to be offered several kicks at goal but Sexton proved why he was the bottom ranked goalkicker in the Six Nations even before the match started with a nightmare performance. By contrast, Dan Parks hardly put a foot wrong and scored 18 of Scotland’s 23 points.
The strength of the Scottish team this year has been their back row of Killer Bees (Brown, Barclay and Beattie) and they combined for Scotland’s only try, following up a turnover deep in their own half with a master class of support running for Beattie to go over in the corner, helped on his way by a tickle instead of a tackle from Irish full back Geordan Murphy, an oft-repeated misdemeanour which saw him withdrawn in favour of the half-fit Kearney before half time.
So Ireland’s rugby tenure at Croke Park comes to an end with the newly named Aviva Stadium due to open later this year. Their record at the larger stadium has not been great, defeats to Scotland, Wales, France and New Zealand as well as a draw against Australia. In the four years I can only think of two occasions when the atmosphere was truly compelling: THAT win over England in 2007 and the Munster Leinster Heineken Cup semi final last year. The rest of the time, the atmosphere has been a little dead. One columnist called it (correctly in my view) the worst place in the world to watch a bad game of rugby.
The Aviva Stadium is smaller (50,000 as opposed to 80,000 seats) and getting hold of a ticket on match days is going to be ever more difficult. But hopefully, once inside the tighter environs will make the place a fortress and bring back the intimate passionate atmosphere that the old ground could generate.