{"id":256647,"date":"2025-11-02T02:13:10","date_gmt":"2025-11-02T02:13:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/256647\/"},"modified":"2025-11-02T02:13:10","modified_gmt":"2025-11-02T02:13:10","slug":"all-blacks-sink-14-man-ireland-in-chicago-in-perfect-start-to-grand-slam-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/256647\/","title":{"rendered":"All Blacks sink 14-man Ireland in Chicago in perfect start to Grand Slam tour"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"css-2425b0\">New Zealand recovered from a 10-point deficit to open their bid for an Autumn Nations Series Grand Slam with a hard-fought 26-13 victory over 14-man Ireland at Soldier Field on<br \/>\nSaturday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Tries from flanker Ardie Savea, Tamaiti Williams, Wallace Sititi and Cam Roigard clinched a scrappy win as the All Blacks avenged their famous 2016 defeat to Ireland at the same venue.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.stan.com.au\/watch\/sport\/rugby\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" class=\"css-tm001h\">Watch the Wallabies take on Italy live and on demand via Stan Sport.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Ireland&#8217;s attempt to repeat their Soldier Field triumph of nine years ago was hamstrung just minutes into Saturday&#8217;s Test when lock forward Tadgh Beirne was shown a yellow card following a collision with All Blacks fly-half Beauden Barrett.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">That yellow was later upgraded to a red card, leaving Ireland with 14 men for virtually the entirety of the game.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The Irish, though, shrugged off their numerical disadvantage in a positive opening, with a converted Tadgh Furlong try and a Jack Crowley penalty giving them a 10-0 lead midway through the first half.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">New Zealand hit back with a converted try from Savea that left it 10-7 at half-time, and although a Crowley penalty helped Ireland into a 13-7 lead just after the break, New Zealand upped the pace to run in tries from replacements Williams and Sititi before scrum-half Roigard dotted down three minutes from time to seal the win.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">New Zealand now head to Europe, where they will face Test matches against Scotland, England and Wales as they attempt to repeat their 2010 Grand Slam of Britain and Ireland.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">New Zealand head coach Scott Robertson was satisfied at how his team responded after trailing early on.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">&#8220;It&#8217;s special &#8212; we fought our way back into it,&#8221; Robertson said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">&#8220;It was a bit like an NFL game there were so many stoppages and we just couldn&#8217;t get any flow.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">&#8220;But the young guys came on and just kept playing, and playing fearlessly. It was great to see us execute.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Ireland hooker Dan Sheehan said his team had &#8220;never really got going&#8221; but refused to blame rust for the team&#8217;s defeat in their first major match since last season&#8217;s Six Nations.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">&#8220;We just couldn&#8217;t put the whole picture together,&#8221; Sheehan said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">&#8220;There&#8217;s a lot to work and hopefully we can bounce back next week and turn it around.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">&#8220;We weren&#8217;t going to use (the layoff) as an excuse. Training the last two weeks has been physical. We thought we were in a good spot; just things didn&#8217;t click for us today.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The flashpoint of a hard-fought encounter came after just three minutes when Ireland lock Beirne was sent to the sin-bin for an upright challenge on Beauden Barrett near the Irish line that was subsequently upgraded to a red card.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Ireland, however, overcame Beirne&#8217;s absence to battle into a 10-0 lead. Fly-half Crowley got the first Irish points on the board with a penalty and then went 10 points clear as Furlong barreled over from close range after an attacking lineout.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">New Zealand, meanwhile, had to deal with disruptions of their own, with captain Scott Barrett and brother Jordie Barrett leaving the game with injuries in separate incidents.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The All Blacks responded to the Irish try with a brilliant attack that began when Jordie Barrett&#8217;s replacement, Leicester Fainga&#8217;anuku, burst into space and offloaded to fullback Will Jordan.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Jordan raced clear before the ball was worked wide to the right, where a huge New Zealand overlap ended with Savea dotting down in the corner.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Beauden Barrett kicked the conversion from the touchline to make it 10-7, with that scoreline holding to half-time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Crowley kicked Ireland into a 13-7 lead just after half-time, but as New Zealand upped the tempo, the under-powered Irish resistance finally broke.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Replacement prop Williams burrowed over from close range after a quick tap penalty and Barrett&#8217;s conversion put the All Blacks 14-13 up.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Another lightning-fast New Zealand break sparked by Beauden Barrett put Damian McKenzie clear and the replacement flipped inside to give Sititi an easy score. <\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Moments from full-time scrum-half Roigard weaved over from a five-meter scrum to complete the scoring.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Zealand recovered from a 10-point deficit to open their bid for an Autumn Nations Series Grand Slam&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":256648,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[10751,64,63,26779,760,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-256647","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-all-blacks","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-rugby","13":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=256647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256647\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/256648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=256647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=256647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=256647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}