Tired Ireland run out of steam

Just when you thought the Irish scrum might survive a tour to the southern hemisphere unscathed, they received a mauling from the very team that had been mauled by England two weeks ago, and this was never more evident than when Chris Henry released while in retreat and was picked off by Wallabies’ scrum-half Luke Burgess.

The lineout was only marginally less messy. The wonder was that Ireland remained in touch — and led by four points on the verge of half-time — without anything resembling a platform off which to work.

Even when the lineout did provide them with usable ball they failed to give it the care it deserved. The backline were plain negligent and none was more culpable than Brian O’Driscoll, who made at least four basic handling errors and looked like a man who has just played too much rugby.

With a little bit of help from referee Bryce Lawrence, who even punished the Wallabies occasionally at scrum-time, Jonathan Sexton kept the points coming throughout the first half, kicking five from five and ensuring that Ronan O’Gara remains stuck on 99 caps. Sexton’s accuracy, plus the big improvement in Ireland’s defence, gave a surprisingly large Irish support reason to believe their patched-up team might stumble to an unlikely win.

The problem was the volume of defensive work they had to get through. They did it heroically, with Mick O’Driscoll and Niall Ronan unlikely leaders on that front, and with Tomás O’Leary producing some stunning scramble-work to make up partially for his poor service off the base.

But with so much exhausting work to get through, it was only inevitable there would be lapses, and the critical one arrived with the half-time hooter already sounded. Quade Cooper, who was generally in a different class to every other player on the park, had a peek at a gap between both Irish flankers and found a weak response from Shane Jennings, who simply fell off the tackle.

Cooper’s next move, a lightning step inside Rob Kearney, was pure class, but Ireland’s disappointment was that he had been allowed to step so easily beyond the first line of defence. On the scoreboard at least, his try was the difference between the sides.

Cooper’s try salvaged what had been a first half full of mistakes by both sides, with the Wallabies marginally more culpable. Sexton’s early penalty meant Ireland had scored first for the first time on tour and when Giteau made a mess of his first penalty kick, one of the Wallabies’ wounds from last week had been reopened.

Ireland were also doing slightly better out of referee Lawrence’s determination to tick every box. When several offside Wallabies failed to retreat from a Cooper punt, Sexton stabbed over another penalty though this was deleted when the referee decided O’Driscoll had palmed the ball out of play deliberately. Cooper took over the place-kicking duties and did the needful from wide on the left.

The pressure for that penalty stemmed initially from messy lineout delivery and with the scrum already buckling, the last thing Ireland could afford was to give away what possession they had. O’Leary tried to hand Rob Horne a try with a long 50-50 pass only to get a break when the eagle-eyed Lawrence spotted that Cooper had fingertipped the ball a millimetre forward. But then Henry made sure by telegraphing his pass to O’Leary, allowing Burgess a soft interception score.

O’Driscoll spoiled a rare line-break by passing left when the wiser option was inside, but Drew Mitchell’s indiscipline gave Sexton another three-pointer. The regular additions of three points were nourishing, yet Ireland were determined to throw their advantage away, mainly by allowing Cooper’s restarts to bounce and roll into touch in their own 22. They would eventually pay when the fly-half slid outside Jennings.

So that was two soft tries conceded, with the nagging doubt that at this time of the year Australia were always likely to have more gas in their tank. What should have encouraged Ireland was the knowledge that some serviceable lineout ball was finally arriving, and that they had set plays to open up the Wallabies, who had had to reshift their backline because of the departure of Horne.

Yet those moves repeatedly foundered on bad decisions or even worse execution, and one of the worst Wallabies sides we’ve seen was able to pick up cheap turnovers and play the game downfield. They might not have been good enough to put Ireland out of sight — two Giteau penalties were all that came from an execrable second period — but Ireland weren’t good enough to catch them either.

Star man: Quade Cooper (Australia)

Australia: Tries: Burgess 17, Cooper 40. Pens: Cooper (2), Giteau (2)

Ireland: Pens: Sexton (5)

Referee: B Lawrence (New Zealand)

Attendance: 45,498

Australia: J O’Connor; A Ashley-Cooper, R Horne (K Beale h-t), M Giteau, D Mitchell; Q Cooper, L Burgess; B Daley (J Slipper, 54), S Faingaa, S Ma’afu, D Mumm, M Chisholm, R Elsom (capt), R Brown

Ireland: R Kearney (G Murphy, 54); T Bowe, B O’Driscoll (capt), P Wallace, A Trimble; J Sexton, T O’Leary; C Healy, S Cronin (D Varley, 70), T Buckley (T Court, h-t), D O’Callaghan, M O’Driscoll (D Touhy, 70) , N Ronan, S Jennings, C Henry (R Ruddock, 69)