Ireland make hard yards towards Grand Slam tilt

Scotland 15 Ireland 22:Ireland will chase a Grand Slam next Saturday in Cardiff, potentially their first in 61 years and only the second in their history after a flawed but character laden performance at Murrayfield. The visitors rescued a potentially hugely disappointing afternoon with a second half performance that basically won the match.

It was in marked contrast to the opening 40 minutes in which Ireland struggled to find their rhythm. In the end they were rescued by several fine individual performances, notably Stephen Ferris, David Wallace, Tommy Bowe, Luke Fitzgareld and Paul O’Connell and a bloody mindedness and ability to perform under the pressure they had largely created for themselves.

Scotland too played their part, toothless apart from the place-kicking of Chris Paterson and more often when chasing the game a liability with the ball in hand.

Conceding six penalties in the opening 20 minutes, Ireland put themselves under unnecessary pressure especially as Paterson had yet to miss a kick in this season’s Six Nations Championship. He posted the first three opportunities presented, the first from the touchline, which should have been a salutary reminder not to transgress, but Ireland were serial offenders.

South African referee Jonathan Kaplan was quite pernickety when it came to the breakdown as is his prerogative and he took an especially dim view of the visitor’s desire to compete for the ball. The Scots elected not to kick the ball out of play where possible, denying Ireland a platform that is generally lucrative.

Apart from one scrum, Ireland looked comfortable and indeed it was the home side that conceded a couple of free kicks and a penalty in this respect. Ireland were playing a very limited narrow game and this suited an aggressive Scottish defence, whose line speed was good.

Ronan O’Gara lay too deep for much of the half, allowing the Scots cover to drift off him and thereby cutting down the space for the Irish midfield. The visitors rarely looked to get outside the Scottish defence, running cutbacks and also cluttering the space in midfield with forward runners. The Scots main option was to send Graeme Morrison trundling into the 10-12 channel and he did generate go forward ball.

Paul O’Connell, and in particular the outstanding Stephen Ferris and David Wallace, were willing and frequent ball carriers but there was a lack of dynamism at times in recycling as Ireland needed to raise the tempo of the game.

Paterson kicked four penalties to O’Gara’s three in the opening 40 minutes with the respective place-kickers foot perfect in the opening 40 minutes. It was Scotland who enjoyed the best try scoring chance of the half, wing Thom Evans showing blistering pace in latching onto his own chip inside his own half.

He accelerated outside O’Gara and it took a brilliant cover tackle by Tommy Bowe – he was another to excel – on Evans and an equally robust one by captain, Brian O’Driscoll on Phil Godman to prevent a try. The arrival of Jamie Heaslip for the unfortunately injured Denis Leamy provided a little more cohesion to the backrow; largely because they’ve played together for the three previous games.

Heaslip confirmed his presence on 51 minutes when trailing a superb Peter Stringer break from a lineout just outside the Scottish 22. Stringer raced through a gap and timed his inside pass beautifully to the supporting Heaslip who crossed for the try.

This score was a fitting reward for the way Ireland played in those opening 10 minutes of the second half. They injected pace into the game, facilitated by O’Gara playing a great deal flatter. The Irish outhalf looked a different player, Ireland a different team. He tagged on the conversion and then dropped a fine goal on 56 minutes after some great feet by Fitzgerald, another producing a fine individual display.

Scotland continued to fling the ball around but their progress was more touchline to touchline than penetrative and once Ireland maintained their shape and discipline, the home side laboured to establish any sort of territorial platform. At 19-12 the visitors’ primary requirement was to keep putting pace and width on the game but instead they conceded a brace of sloppy penalties, from the second of which Paterson landed to keep the home side in touch at 19-15.

O’Gara had an opportunity to extend Ireland’s lead after the Scots were penalised for not releasing at a ruck but his effort from 45 metres drifted left and wide but he made no mistake – it resulted from a great chase by Rob Kearney and Fitzgerald to a Tomás O’Leary kick – on 71 minutes with arguably a more difficult opportunity from close to the touchline.

Ireland were also benefitting from some lamentable handling by the home side, whose efforts to run from deep were largely were largely negated by their carelessness.

Kearney’s hack and chase almost led to a try but Chris Cusiter intervened and, deep inside the Scottish 22, O’Leary tapped the ball out to signal the end of the match.

The Grand Slam dream lives on…………just.

Scoring sequence

5 mins: Paterson penalty, 3-0; 10: O’Gara penalty, 3-3; 12: Paterson penalty, 6-3; 20: Paterson penalty, 9-3; 26: O’Gara penalty, 9-6; 31: Paterson penalty, 12-6; 33: O’Gara penalty, 12-9. Half-time: 12-9. 51: Heaslip try, O’Gara conversion, 12-16; 56: O’Gara drop goal, 12-19; 60: Paterson penalty, 15-19; 71: O’Gara penalty, 15-22.

Scotland: C Paterson (Edinburgh); S Danielli (Ulster), M Evans (Glasgow), G Morrison (Glasgow), T Evans (Glasgow); P Godman (Edinburgh), M Blair (Edinburgh (Edinburgh, capt); A Dickinson (Gloucester), R Ford (Edinburgh), E Murray (Northampton); J White (Sale), J Hamilton (Edinburgh); A Strokosch (Gloucester), J Barclay (Glasgow), S Taylor (Stade Francais). Replacements: N Hines (Perpignan) for White 50 mins; C Cussiter (Perpignan) for Blair 52 mins; D Hall (Glasgow) for Ford 57 mins; S Gray (Northampton) for Barclay 67 mins; N de Luca (Edinburgh) for Morrison 69 mins.

Ireland: R Kearney (Leinster); T Bowe (Ospreys), B O'Driscoll (Leinster, capt), G D'Arcy (Leinster), L Fitzgerald (Leinster); R O'Gara (Munster), P Stringer (Munster); M Horan (Munster), R Best (Ulster), J Hayes (Munster); D O'Callaghan (Munster), P O'Connell (Munster); S Ferris (Ulster), D Wallace (Munster), D Leamy (Munster). Replacements: J Heaslip (Leinster) for Leamy 29 mins; J Flannery (Munster) for Best 60 mins; T O'Leary (Munster) for Stringer 65 mins; G Murphy (Leicester) for Kearney 75 mins.

Referee: J Kaplan (South Africa).