New and old eye next stage

Luke Fitzgerald's career graph continues upward. The Blackrock teenager already has plenty of scrapbook fodder.

Playing his first match in the last game to be played in the old stadium. Pulling on his number 14 shirt beside captain Brian O'Driscoll. Doing a lap of honour to a cheering crowd of thousands and surviving one of the more physical sides he is likely to meet. Yes, for the 19-year-old survival was on his mind.

"When you see fellas like (Alesana) Tuilagi coming at you, the physicality does kind of dawn on you," said the winger. "But I'd have to say I was a little bit worried about it and I was delighted to get through the game in the fashion that I did.

"Yeah, I got some ball. It was a chance to test myself against some great athletes and I thought I came off okay. I took some knocks and there's one or two little things. My shoulder kinda hurt me a little bit when I hit that fella Tuilagi, but I feel fine actually. Surprisingly.

"It was a great experience, really. It kind of passed by very quickly, the pace of the game. They really did put it up to us, especially in the first half. But I enjoyed it and hope to get another shot. It was step up from Leinster, which took some time to get used to. But I thought I survived quite well physically."

With Girvan Dempsey, Denis Hickie and Shane Horgan serving Michael Cheika's Leinster side, you can see Fitzgerald's dilemma.

"The challenge for me is to get into the Leinster set-up at the moment," he said. "It's so competitive there. That would be my goal for the season, to try and break in there. Obviously, I'd hope to perform here in the future and hopefully, today's performance would warrant inclusion in the training squad at least.

"I played an international match today. But the level of the competition is so good in Leinster it's a challenge. I have to break in there first and maybe then it will be easier to get in here (Ireland). That's what I'm hoping."

Shane Horgan has no such concerns. Playing in the centre on this occasion and bouncing Seru Rabeni out of the way to run in his 18th international try is just par for the course after 51 caps. But different faces in a new-look side can sometimes disrupt.

"There was a possibility that could have happened but it didn't happen. We'd three new guys coming in but we wanted to perform. We didn't want to allow it to drop just because we weren't playing a tier-one nation," said Horgan.

"From that point of view we were happy with the way things went, especially in the second half when we got a bit more substance to our game.

"It was great for those guys who came in. They worked very well. They have been with us in camp in September and right through this autumn series. From that point of view there wasn't as much apprehension as there might be if you are picking a guy from completely left field.

"I think they stepped up very well. Stephen Ferris was exceptional. Jamie (Heaslip) carried the ball very well and Luke showed flashes of what he can do."

With the autumn chapter closed, the winter chapter begins. The win was a big one and needed to be. But Team Ireland have developed a new character. They growl more, are less easily pleased.

"There is a lot of confidence around now, from the players, from the management, from the media, from the fans. That's good," said Horgan. "The next stage, which is what we've always said, is we've got to win something, a Six Nations Championship, a Grand Slam. That's where we want to aim. That's where the team want to be. This is a good base but we haven't won anything."