They paid the ultimate price for the shortcomings in their performance, one that ran the gamut of indiscipline, a misfiring lineout, missed tackles of the straight-up variety, and the sort of basic errors that will age Andrew Browne and his coaching team.<\/p>\n
Place-kicking aberrations were also costly as England outhalf Hugh Shields nailed five from six opportunities from the kicking tee. And yet Ireland played some brilliant rugby at times, scored cracking tries, including a hat-trick for left wing Daniel Ryan, while Noah Byrne and Jack Deegan bagged the others. The latter had a barnstorming game on his introduction at half-time.<\/p>\n
The Irish scrum dominated, with Dylan McNeice a standout, as was Charlie O\u2019Shea in his general play, while James O\u2019Leary, Max Doyle, Josh Neill and Ryan made conspicuously positive contributions. Two bonus points will have to be a salve of sorts as they now prepare for Argentina next Thursday.<\/p>\n
Ireland were left to rue rank discipline, basic missed tackles and simple mistakes that cost them dearly in an opening 40 minutes, in which they had the advantage of a strong wind in the Georgian capital. That translated to two Irish players \u2013 McNeice and Ben Blaney \u2013 receiving yellow cards, and a penalty try.<\/p>\n
When Browne\u2019s side were short-handed England punished them by scoring 21-points, and all three tries were soft in the way in which they were conceded.<\/p>\n
![\"Ireland's](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/TX3VEFAT65FEPZILF5VYZ3PE5M.jpg\")
Ireland’s Dylan McNeice dejected after the defeat to England. Photograph: Levan Verdzeuli\/Inpho <\/p>\n
It was a far cry from the opening six minutes of the match in which Ryan crossed for a brace of tries, with the creative influence coming from outhalf Charlie O\u2019Shea. McNeice and Rob Carney made line-breaks and O\u2019Shea showed vision and great technique on the run to put in a crosskick for the first try.<\/p>\n
For the second, the Irish outhalf\u2019s gliding break made the initial inroads, before he linked with Byrne and the fullback\u2019s inside pass sent Ryan over for a second try. At 12-0 up, Ireland seemed set fair, but what followed was a complete unravelling, pockmarked by ill discipline and an inability to complete basic tasks.<\/p>\n
A couple of missed tackles from Byrne gave England access to the Irish backfield and while Ireland rode their luck initially as Sam Winters had a try disallowed, McNeice\u2019s departure to the sinbin saw England rack up 14 points through converted tries by hooker Jimmy Staples and fullback James Pater. Missed tackles were costly.<\/p>\n
Ireland conceded a penalty try, although England should have been pinged for blocking in the lineout maul. Referee Ben Connor missed the obvious transgression and instead awarded a penalty try and brandished a yellow card to Irish flanker Blaney for collapsing the maul.<\/p>\n
A fifth penalty conceded in succession soon after the restart had them risking further censure. Sixth and seventh offences had referee Connor warn Ireland captain Sami Bishti that they faced having a third player dispatched to the sin bin. Restarts out on the full and an overthrown lineout in the English 22 were other bugbears.<\/p>\n
The Irish scrum was an aspect of Ireland\u2019s display that was beyond reproach as it enjoyed a pronounced edge. It was from that platform that Ryan grabbed his hat-trick try, once again thanks to brilliant work from O\u2019Shea.<\/p>\n
![\"Ireland's](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/DBNR2DWD4KWFXA56KYARPZ4JBI.jpg\")
Ireland’s Tom Wood is tackled by England’s Oliver Spencer. Photograph: Levan Verdzeuli\/Inpho <\/p>\n
England grabbed a fourth try, Ireland\u2019s defence again brittle, but to their credit Browne\u2019s charges they kept playing, Byrne with a couple of good moments with the boot and Ryan had a potential fourth try ruled out. The English side conceded a fourth straight penalty but only got a warning; a fifth saw flanker Seb Kelly sent to the bin.<\/p>\n
Ryan\u2019s failure to ground the ball, a couple of lineout turnovers, no tap from a penalty five metres out, and the referee\u2019s failure to go to his pocket again when England racked up another two penalties in their 22, provided a spiralling level of frustration.<\/p>\n
And then on 66 minutes, the Irish backline showed their class, replacement Deegan with two powerful surges, and slick hands allowed Ryan to put Byrne over for Ireland\u2019s fourth try. A brilliant line from Neill took play into the England 22, and after Duinn Maguire was grounded short, Deegan barrelled over from close range.<\/p>\n
Shields kicked a penalty to push England out to a 34-27 lead, before Deegan won a restart, the English transgressed twice in their 22, and bizarrely got a final, final warning from the referee O\u2019Connor. But Ireland turned over another lineout, five metres from their opponents\u2019 line and further Irish indiscipline allowed England to freewheel to the final whistle, two further penalties taking the jeopardy out of those final minutes.<\/p>\n
SCORING SEQUENCE \u2013 1 min: Ryan try, O\u2019Shea con, 7-0; 6: Ryan try, 12-0; 14: Staples try, Shields con, 12-7; 18: Pater try, Shields con, 12-14; 23: Penalty try, 12-21; 37: Shields pen, 12-24. Half-time: 12-24. 42: Ryan try, 17-24; 45: Knight try, Shields con, 17-31; 66: Byrne try, 22-31; 68: Deegan try, 27-31; 72: Shields penalty, 27-34.<\/p>\n
IRELAND: Noah Byrne (Dublin University); Charlie Molony (UCD), Rob Carney (Cashel), James O\u2019Leary (UCC), Daniel Ryan (Corinthians); Charlie O\u2019Shea (UCC), Christopher Barrett (UCC); Max Doyle (UCD), Rian Handley (Old Wesley), Sami Bishti (UCD, capt); Donnacha McGuire (UCD), Dylan McNeice (UCD); Josh Neill (Old Wesley), Ben Blaney (Terenure), Diarmaid O\u2019Connell (Corinthians).<\/p>\n
Replacements: Jack Deegan (Blackrock) for Carney (h-t); Duinn Maguire (UCD) for Handley, Alex Lautsou (Shannon) for Blaney (both 59 mins); Tom Wood (Garryowen) for O\u2019Shea (60); Paddy Woods (QUB) for McGuire, Adam Cooper (Buccaneers) for Doyle (both 65); Blake McClean for Bishti (71). <\/p>\n
Yellow cards: D McNeice (13 mins); B Blaney (23).<\/p>\n
ENGLAND: James Pater; Zac Finch, Nick Lilley, Will Knight, Sam Winters; Hugh Shields, Lucas Friday; Alan Poku, Jimmy Staples, Ollie Streeter; Elliot Williams, Aiden Ainsworth-Cave; Tate Williams, Seb Kelly, Connor Treacey (capt).<\/p>\n
Replacements: Oliver Spencer for Poku (55 mins); George Pearson for Finch (64); Patrick Hogg for Williams, Sonny Tonga\u2019uiha for Streeter (both 70); Jack Lewis for Kelly (74).<\/p>\n
Yellow card: Kelly (59 mins).<\/p>\n
Referee: Ben Connor (Wales).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Under-20 World Championship: England 34 Ireland 27 This will hurt, and it should. Ireland will be haunted by…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":522316,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,1449,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-522315","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-ireland-rugby","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522315","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=522315"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522315\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/522316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522315"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522315"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522315"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}