Warren Gatland's final home match in charge of Wales ended in a 22-17 defeat to Ireland as the latter bounced back in Cardiff on Saturday.
Following an embarrassing loss to England at Twickenham last weekend, Ireland will be delighted with this response at Principality Stadium.
Jacob Stockdale scored two while the Irish also carded a penalty try, with Jack Carty kicking five points on his birthday in a solid shift.
In reply for Wales, Owen Lane and Rhys Patchell scored their tries, the latter adding two conversion while Jarrod Evans slotted a penalty.
Ireland enjoyed a much-improved first half in Cardiff and opened the scoring on nine minutes when the impressive Carty slotted from 40 out. However, Wales levelled matters six minutes later through Evans from in front, this after Peter O'Mahony was trapped at the base of a ruck.
The game then went rather stale before a high take from Will Addison sparked an attack, with Carty's mini break carried on well by Andrew Conway, whose run led to him finding Stockdale on the left wing for a run in. With the difficult conversion added, the Irish were 10-3 up.
Wales and Evans missed the chance to reduce the arrears off the tee eight minutes later and soon after a stray offload from Aaron Shingler allowed Stockdale to hack downfield and then collect for his brace, pushing the Irish into a healthy 15-3 lead at the Principality Stadium.
Despite Carty missing a long-range penalty shot at the end of the opening period, Joe Schmidt would have been happy with his side's effort.
The second half was much improved from Wales, however, as despite being dominated at scrum time they offered much more with Patchell at 10.
The Welsh cause wasn't helped when replacement prop Leon Brown was sin-binned for his team's repeated infringements at the set-piece. The Irish almost rubbed salt into Wales' wounds soon after but Carty's pass out right to Conway for a score was chalked off for being forward.
Congratulations to @JackCarty10 who has been named the Man of the Match! #TeamOfUs #ShoulderToShoulder #WALvIRE pic.twitter.com/s15AB2MpwV
— Irish Rugby (@IrishRugby) August 31, 2019
Schmidt's men would continue to turn the screw though at the scrum and eventually the pressure told as Romain Poite awarded a penalty try.
At 22-3 down Wales needed the next points and fortunately for them they got it as Lane's tidy finish gave them a foothold at 22-10 adrift.
Amazingly they were only five points away from Ireland with three minutes left as Patchell slipped over for another converted score, this coming after the Irish had their own try chalked off due to Bundee Aki tackling James Davies in the air, much to the centre's displeasure.
But Ireland would hold on for a positive result on the road as both these sides will now recover ahead of a rematch in Dublin next weekend.
The scorers:
For Wales:
Tries: Lane, Patchell
Cons: Patchell 2
Pen: Evans
Yellow Card: Brown
For Ireland:
Tries: Stockdale 2, Penalty try
Con: Carty
Pen: Carty
Wales: 15 Hallam Amos, 14 Owen Lane, 13 Scott Williams, 12 Owen Watkin, 11 Steff Evans, 10 Jarrod Evans, 9 Aled Davies, 8 Josh Navidi (c), 7 James Davies, 6 Aaron Shingler, 5 Bradley Davies, 4 Adam Beard, 3 Samson Lee, 2 Ryan Elias, 1 Rhys Carre
Replacements: 16 Elliot Dee, 17 Rob Evans, 18 Leon Brown, 19 Jake Ball, 20 Aaron Wainwright, 21 Tomos Williams, 22 Rhys Patchell, 23 Jonah Holmes
Ireland: 15 Will Addison, 14 Andrew Conway, 13 Chris Farrell, 12 Bundee Aki, 11 Jacob Stockdale, 10 Jack Carty, 9 Kieran Marmion, 8 Jack Conan, 7 Peter O’Mahony (c), 6 Tadhg Beirne, 5 James Ryan, 4 Iain Henderson, 3 John Ryan, 2 Niall Scannell, 1 Dave Kilcoyne
Replacements: 16 Rory Best, 17 Andrew Porter, 18 Tadhg Furlong, 19 Devin Toner, 20 Jordi Murphy, 21 Luke McGrath, 22 Garry Ringrose, 23 Dave Kearney
Referee: Romain Poite (France)
Assistant referees: Jérôme Garcès (France), Karl Dickson (England)
TMO: Rowan Kitt (England)
No comments:
Post a Comment