Ireland are set to evaluate what possible steps they could take with Women’s Rugby World Cup officials following Aoife Wafer’s complaint to match officials that she was bitten on the arm by a French player during their World Cup quarter-final defeat on Sunday.

Video footage shows French forward Axelle Berthoumieu’s mouth move towards her rival back-rower’s forearm as they contest a ruck on the ground, with Wafer emerging from contact clutching the area and mouthing: “she bit me” to match referee Aimee Barrett Theron.

Ireland captain Sam Monaghan confirmed she had also relayed her concerns about the incident to Barrett Theron following the 18-13 defeat at Sandy Park which sees France progress to a semi-final next Sunday in Bristol against either England or Scotland.

Ireland’s tournament is over, though, and whether or not there is a case for Barthoumieu to answer, will not impact on Monaghan’s side.

“I spoke to the referee, I didn’t see it,” Monaghan said. “I spoke to the referee and asked could they have a look at it.” 

The captain added of the subsequent check, “was through TMO.” While TMO Ian Tempest was not heard to report back on any check, Ireland have four hours after the final whistle to lodge a complaint while the match citing commissioner has 12 hours after full time to do the same.

Ireland head coach Scott Bemand said he would not initially “get drawn into” the matter during his post-match media conference.

“We’ve literally just stepped off the pitch,” Bemand said. “If there’s any bits to pick up, we’ll pick up in the next hour.

“I think in terms of process, your on-pitch leadership would mention to the referee. Then it’s up to the team officials to deal with it should they see fit at that point.

“I’m not going to get drawn into anything at this point, at the moment, I haven’t seen anything. As I said I’ve literally stepped in here.” 

Bemand added: “If there are bits to pursue, we could potentially be disappointed but we’ve followed the process as best we can from our perspective in terms of the on-pitch conversations.” 

Both Monaghan and Bemand spoke of their pride in their team’s performance as they reflected on a game that had seen Ireland take a 13-0 interval lead thanks to tries from Linda Djougang and Stacey Flood plus a penalty from Dannah O’Brien when they made the most of the atrocious weather with the wind and rain at their backs and a yellow card for tighthead prop Rose Bernadou on 18 minutes.

France lost captain Manae Feleu to a yellow just before half-time but were able to weather the on-pitch storm with their skipper in the sin bin and wiped out their half-time deficit through a penalty from Morgane Bourgeois followed by tries from Charlotte Escudero and Joanna Grisez before a further Bourgeois penalty left Ireland chasing a converted try to keep their tournament alive.

It did not come but Bemand said: “I’m really proud, really proud of the group and where they’ve come from in the two years.

“It was a tough Test match today, the occasion – you think a year ago, that group might have felt the occasion more but I could see it in the eyes of the players when they stepped off the bus… the Irish support has been fantastic all the way through the competition.

“The crowd was singing the Fields of Athenry and our group don’t get daunted by that any more. They get excited by it.

“It was a tough Test match in terms of conditions, we tried to play the conditions really, really well. There were some bits that that worked, some bits put us under pressure.

“And with a young group, we’ve always been talking about the next four-year cycle as well, we know that this group is going to stick together, and this group’s going to get better and better. “

Monaghan said she was more than satisfied that her team exited Ireland’s first World Cup campaign in eight years with no regrets.

“That’s what I asked from the girls at the start of the game,” the captain said. ‘Don’t let a moment get by you, leave everything you can out there’, and I truly believe we did.

“You can see it in the player’s faces, they are heartbroken, but it’s such a proud (dressing-room). I couldn’t ask for more from them. We gave it all, we brought them to 90 minutes, probably, in the end with the five (added) minutes from the first half, but I’m extremely proud of this group.

“It is a young group as Scott said, like, you know, only 31 player out 32 has experienced a World Cup before, so you know, if you do look back two years ago, we were competing in WX3, and you know, we were very, very close to winning a World Cup quarter-final there.

“We’re gutted, we’re heartbroken. We know we could have had that game, but we’ll hold our heads high, rebuild and grow together.”