Ireland pile pressure on England with bonus-point win
Ireland piled maximum pressure on England ahead of the defending Six Nations champions’ clash with France by collecting a bonus point in their 28-8 victory over Scotland.
Joe Schmidt’s men knew a haul of five points from the match in Dublin would leave Eddie Jones’ side needing to achieve the same in Paris later on Saturday to set up a St Patrick’s Day decider at Twickenham next weekend.
And the hosts ran in four tries in Dublin to put themselves firmly in the box seat for Six Nations glory.
Rory Best looks forward to the Twickenham test against England
Jacob Stockdale crossed twice in the first half to become the first Irishman to score six tries in a single campaign, before Conor Murray added a third after the interval.
Sean Cronin’s fourth could be decisive and means England need to score at least four tries in winning in the day’s late kick-off.
Scotland’s shock win at Murrayfield last weekend is to thank for the precarious status of England’s title defence, but their away struggles continued in Dublin. Scotland have won only two matches outside Edinburgh or Rome since the championship expanded to six teams in 2000.
4? from 4?!@IrishRugby are heading to Twickenham for a tilt at a Grand Slam in Round 5?!
All the reaction to #IREvSCO: https://t.co/VE3F2xyYMW#NatWest6Nations pic.twitter.com/WU4Ndp1zfg
— Guinness Men's Six Nations (@SixNationsRugby) March 10, 2018
Ireland adopted a positive approach from kick-off and, after putting Scotland under early pressure, opted to kick a penalty for touch rather than settle for three points from the boot of Jonathan Sexton.
That decision bore no fruit and Scotland punished their hosts with their first real foray into the Irish half after 12 minutes, when Greig Laidlaw knocked over from the tee for the first points of the match.
As the odd loose pass crept into the Irish game, Scotland demonstrated the extent of their handling skills in a bright period of play for Gregor Townsend’s men.
However, it was an ambitious attempted pass from Peter Horne that led to the opening try, with Stockdale making the interception to give himself a clear run for the line.
Sexton’s conversion opened up a 7-3 lead after 24 minutes but Scotland should have been back in front soon after when Huw Jones fluffed his lines by misplacing a pass to Stuart Hogg with the full-back virtually guaranteed to touch down if the delivery was better.
Scotland’s determination to play the first half at a frantic pace came with frustratingly little reward and, after Bundee Aki was held up on the line, Stockdale stepped inside Blair Kinghorn to stretch the Irish advantage to 11 points on the stroke of half-time – his 10th try in eight Tests.
6 – @JacobStockdale is the first @IrishRugby player to score 6 tries in a 5/6 Nations campaign, he is the fourth player from any nation to score 6 in @SixNationsRugby tournament (since Italy joined in 2000). Unstoppable. pic.twitter.com/9Y9qMaC29Q
— OptaJonny (@OptaJonny) March 10, 2018
Having rued an inspired Scottish display at Murrayfield last weekend, English fans will have been praying for a second-half recovery but had to watch through their fingers as Murray was dragged over the line to edge Ireland closer to the all-important bonus point.
Scotland again failed to take a chance when it was presented after 50 minutes, the pass from Hogg played too high for Kinghorn, who did touch down in the corner moments later, although Laidlaw was unable to add the extras.
Another missed Sexton penalty raised questions over Ireland’s decision to go for the posts rather than touch with 15 minutes left, but replacement Cronin crossed after a driving maul to further focus English minds in Paris and keep their Grand Slam hopes alive.
Key Opta stats:
– Ireland are unbeaten in their last 14 home games in the Six Nations (W12, D2), before that run they had never gone more than seven such matches in the Five or Six Nations without defeat.
– Overall Ireland have won their last 11 Test matches, a new record for them.
– Scotland have won away to Ireland just once in the Six Nations (L9), a 23-20 victory at Croke Park in 2010; since that win Scotland have lost 17 of their 19 away games in the Championship, with their only victories coming against Italy (2014 and 2016).
– Since the 2015 Rugby World Cup Conor Murray has scored nine Test tries (including one for the Lions), two more than any other Tier 1 scrum-half. (TJ Perenara – seven).
Comments on RugbyPass
I like to see the Crusaders lose as much as the next non-Crusaders fan, but the fact that most of their best players have not been available this year is being hand waved away like it shouldn’t effect them. It’s no coincidence that their first dominant performance came when they had more of their best players back. This is not rocket science. If they can stay fit their team at the business end of the season will include Tamaiti Williams, Codie Taylor, Fletcher Newell, Scott Barrett, Quentin Strange, Ethan Blackadder and Cullen Grace in the forwards - most of whom have barely, or not played this year. That is an outstanding pack that have not played together this season. McLeod, Havili, Aumua, Reece, and Halfpenny will be a very different prospect behind their first choice pack as well. Having said all that Penney’s record is scratchy at best, but given the players that have left and their injury list I’m reserving judgement. Penney’s appointment, a bit like Foz, has a similar stench of the incumbent having too much say in his replacement. They are lacking a truly high quality and experienced 10 which will make it hard for them to go the whole way IMO, but the list of teams who would want to play them in the finals will be very short.
17 Go to commentsWhere’s this people's champion come from? Irish people yes….other people? Their arrogance has become breathtaking. Not tested? Oh dear.
160 Go to commentsIf a coach having Crusaders heritage is so sacrosanct, why did the Crusaders not pursue Vern Cotter as Scott Robertson’s replacement?
17 Go to commentsFinau is definitely operating on razor thin margins. He hasn’t done anything wrong… yet. But a player going into contact 6 inches lower than he is expecting, without him even knowing, will end in disaster. You can imagine a situation where the pass dies on Edmed and he has to bend down a little lower to catch it at the last second. Finau’s hit would have been catastrophic. The margins are just too fine. He needs to study how PSDT, at 6’7”, manages to drop his tackle height and exert just as much force with close zero danger of taking someone’s head off. Given how poorly NZ has adapted to lower their tackle height, and that this issue which has plagued the ABs for years and played a big part in them not winning the World Cup, I thought NZR and all SR coaches would be prioritising sorting this issue out. If I was Razor I would be on the phone to Clayton MacMillan and Samipeni Finau saying exactly that. Finau is a monster and shaping up to be the closest thing to Kaino since Kaino, but I wouldn’t risk selecting him for the ABs at the moment.
18 Go to commentsThe surprising stat I saw in the Blues game when showing Sotutu equaling the Blues forwards record was that Akira has not scored a try since 2019. Now my memory is pretty bad when it comes to those sorts of the things, I can remember his AB try though, but anyway I can’t see I can remember his last blues touchdown or any in recent years. Surely that still has to be a bogus stat. Maybe excludes SRA games?
3 Go to commentsDude to me looks pretty fast for a big man, nearly 2m and 130kg, in his workout vid he was signed off. Possibly a bit slow on his reads movement wise though, but I’ve not got anything to compare him to. Hope the dude nails it and finds his sport, could have been a devastating lock in rugby if he wasn’t a footballer growing up.
4 Go to commentsWell, does that make it every year Moana has lost it’s best player the following year? Normally it’s more immediate I guess, at least there best player had a follow up year this time.
1 Go to commentsFinally, an answer to Dan Carter.
1 Go to commentsNever read such tripe. He was hit just as he passed the ball which was reviewed and deemed legal by yes the Australian TMO and referee
18 Go to commentsTerrible idea…will be too hot, no one will travel, fan zones will be promised nice cold guinness and last minute will get water. Also how do you squeeze this into the already busy battle rhythm, Prem, summer series, 6 nations & world cup….if, and its a big IF you’re going to do this, do it in a rugby nation.
2 Go to commentsWell let’s hope world rugby doesn't read some of this nonsense, because next on the agenda will be…“players will only tackle other players deemed to be in their weight class, and only with moderate velocity”.
18 Go to commentsI was never allowed to adjust boots, or ever replaced, while I was playing and staying on the field. If I had issues, I had to go to the sideline and fix them myself. Then I would ask the ref to get back in. That would really make you deal with it FAST!
6 Go to commentsGreat point. It would be terrible to have a card for poor tackling cost the all blacks a world cup. Oh hi all blacks captain Sam Cane, how you going?
18 Go to commentsI like Andy’s critical approach to all hot issues especially when it comes to the rugby big “bosses”. However, sorry Andy, I don’t support your “we shouldn’t be questioning the integrity of Karl Dickson or any other official”. May I ask why? They do have a lot of responsibility, but they are people like us with all their sins and weaknesses. We have to respect their decision during the games, but why they became untouchable afterwards and people cannot even criticize them and the ones, who does express their concerns, got punished for publicly analyzing their mistakes and asking questions. If they believe they did right, there shouldn’t be a problem for any of the refs to answer these “questions” publicly. I don’t really remember such cases. However, I do remember how Craig Joubert shown his running skills in 2015 or Pascal Gauzere shined in Cardiff in 2021. I do believe that Rassie, as anybody else, had a full right to share his vision of Nic Berry’s performance the same year. I do not support the hate in any form especially in public one, but creating the cast of untouchable refs and rugby bosses is not for me. As for Karl, he had all means to question his appointment for the game and since I don’t now whether he did it, blaming just RFU wouldn’t be quite correct at this moment. I love the game of rugby and almost every time I watch it I don’t support any team, I just wanna see the good game and fair referring. Sorry, Karl. last Saturday you got my Craig Joubert”s award of the round. It is up to Karl to prove that I am wrong, not to Andy or RFU’s corporate bla-bla-bla. Something like that…
1 Go to commentswell remember the blues had a guy called jed rowlands for a season. remember scott took his coaching team with him give him time
17 Go to commentswell maybe he needs to be introduced to darcy swain then who never got anything much and put a cheifs ands allblack player out injured and made him miss a season recovering
18 Go to commentswell maybe the match offficals should sort it out if they are worried about it and stop the clock
6 Go to commentsI totally agree. I also believe that minor injuries unless dangerous must be treared OFF the field of play and the game continue with a temp replacement if necessary.
6 Go to commentsSend the bill to McLennan.
3 Go to comments2 out of 3 were perfect. TMOs love jumping in on anything outside the law. The fact they saw nothing wrong speaks volumes. You want to see what a late blindside hit looks like, watch Kepu take out Carter in the 2015 World Cup final. Completely different to the Tah’s tackle.
18 Go to comments