{"id":532903,"date":"2026-07-04T15:58:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T15:58:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/532903\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T15:58:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T15:58:09","slug":"andy-farrell-beams-with-pride-over-irelands-effort-in-hard-fought-win-in-sydney-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/532903\/","title":{"rendered":"Andy Farrell beams with pride over Ireland\u2019s effort in hard-fought win in Sydney \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Good sides find a way to win, even when not playing at their best. While there was much to admire in Ireland<\/a>\u2019s performance against the Wallabies<\/a>, not least in some of their attacking rugby. Above all, they stayed in the fight when it looked like they had no right to do so, and then ultimately had the inner belief, togetherness and perseverance to find a way.<\/p>\n

They are a reflection of their head coach and the team Andy Farrell<\/a> has built. Unsurprisingly then, while he was not inclined to gloss over the imperfections, Farrell took pride in the character his team had shown on a testing, wild, rollercoaster of a night in Sydney<\/a> against these fired-up and finely-tuned Wallabies. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat was a hell of a Test match,\u201d said Farrell after Ireland\u2019s 33-31 victory at Allianz Stadium in their opening game of the inaugural Nations Championship. \u201cIt certainly would have been for the neutral, I would have thought.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut the first thing that comes to mind for me is how proud I am of how the lads showed character in the second half. There were some special moments within the game that deserve a hard-fought win like that, Hugo\u2019s try-saving tackle and Sam with the calmness to get the conversion when he did.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Ireland player ratings v Australia: Hugo Keenan back with a bangOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Keenan\u2019s superb one-on-one try-saving tackle denied Joseph Suaalii a try in the 37th minute when Australia were 24-12 ahead. Even a team as resolute as this Irish side might have struggled to recover from a 19-point deficit.<\/p>\n

Prendergast\u2019s conversion followed Thomas Clarkson\u2019s 77th-minute try, which the outhalf nailed with an unerring strike through the ball. It effectively proved to be the match-winning kick.<\/p>\n

\u201cI suppose it\u2019s a good one for us because there\u2019s plenty to fix, and we need to fix it properly for what\u2019s coming ahead, including next week,\u201d said Farrell, already looking ahead to next Saturday\u2019s game against Japan, who beat Italy 27-10 in Tokyo on Saturday morning. In the third round, Ireland travel to Eden Park to face the All Blacks, who took a thrilling 34-32 win over France in their opener.<\/p>\n

After Keenan\u2019s vital intervention against Suaalii, Ireland declined to kick the ball dead off a scrum inside their own half despite the clock being in the red ahead of half-time. Cue the pick of their five tries, when Jamison Gibson-Park scored off Jack Conan\u2019s half-break and pass infield off a sustained passage of high-quality rugby.<\/p>\n

\"JamisonJamison Gibson-Park celebrates scoring a try for Ireland with team-mate Tadhg Furlong. Photograph: David Neilson\/Inpho <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was huge,\u201d said Farrell. \u201cIt was a hell of a try. And that\u2019s what we pride ourselves on \u2013 everyone being involved, everyone being an option, everyone working hard to make sure that we\u2019re able to make things work as a group. And we certainly were on that occasion, so it was a nice reference of what to do,\u201d Farrelladded.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s were couple of (examples of) what not to do as well, with our carries and stuff like that in the first half. I thought (the Wallabies) won some key moments collision-wise and slowed our ball down, so there\u2019s plenty to fix. But again, the positive is coming away with a big W and fixing on the run. The tour is under way now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Against that, Ireland\u2019s defence leaked nine line breaks in the first half-hour.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019ve got some unbelievable athletes, and the breakdown stuff is a trademark of Australian rugby, and it\u2019s certainly a trademark of Joe Schmidt\u2019s teams as well,\u201d Farrell conceded. \u201cI thought they played off some good quick ball, and I thought our defence wasn\u2019t connected enough, and that was probably because of how they carried and played off the shoulder and straightened up and played through us quite a bit. So, hence why I talked about Hugo\u2019s tackle, it was pretty special.\u201d<\/p>\n

The win didn\u2019t come without some cost, though, as replacement Jeremy Loughman departed within nine minutes of coming on due to a concussion which will mean an automatic 12-day stand-down. With Tom O\u2019Toole and Enda Bohan the only other options at loosehead, it will likely see a call-up, perhaps for Michael Milne.<\/p>\n

\u201c(Loughman) didn\u2019t look too good at the time, but he obviously got up and walked off the field,\u201d said Farrell. \u201cSo, we\u2019ll see how he pulls up tomorrow, but he seems in good enough spirits anyway.\u201d<\/p>\n

Captain Dan Sheehan was also impressed with his side\u2019s resolve, highlighting Gibson-Park\u2019s try. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt was important that we weren\u2019t aiming for half-time and there was no mindset to kick it out and restart in the second half. I thought it was brilliant that we kept attacking the game in the red. And that was a big try for us to make sure we sort of switched momentum going into the second half.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sheehan saw his own finish from a maul nearing the hour, and was soon replaced by R\u00f3nan Kelleher. However the hooker felt assured that Ireland would find a way.<\/p>\n

\"Ireland'sIreland’s Dan Sheehan scores a try that would later be overturned. Photograph: Ben Brady\/Inpho <\/p>\n

\u201cI think we were playing in the right areas of the field, so the way rugby is these days, it\u2019s hard to get out of there. We just needed to make sure we were doing our best to keep pounding the rock, and eventually we got over. But it did take a few times.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe need to be a bit more clinical. A big focus for us in the last week was our conversion rate in the 22, which was a bit sloppy. We probably should have come up with a bit more there, and quicker when we did.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, Sheehan added: \u201cI had full faith in the lads that they had good composure. I thought the bench brought great energy when they came on, and we needed it because that first half was tough. We probably needed fresh faces to bring on a bit of energy.\u201d<\/p>\n

For his part, Schmidt reflected ruefully on the chances his team created that went abegging, notably two line breaks when they were 24-12 ahead in the first half, as well as the costly concession of offside penalties in their own 22.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just felt like for the number of line breaks we didn\u2019t finish, that\u2019s going to sting you. But at the same time, I think people can see that we are going to be difficult enough to stop if we\u2019ve got time and space with the ball, with the options that players are working hard to give us.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere were a couple of guys tonight who made some really nice line breaks, and you certainly don\u2019t want to go square-shouldered into the Irish, because they will put you on your backside. It was nice to be able to work them around a little bit, but at the same time, their scramble, Hugo Keenan\u2019s tackle on Joseph Suaalii, that sort of stuff, is the nature of the Irish. They are not going to give you anything for free.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Good sides find a way to win, even when not playing at their best. While there was much…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":532904,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,1449,86133,43,53328],"class_list":["post-532903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-ireland-rugby","tag-nations-championship","tag-news","tag-wallabies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532903","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=532903"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532903\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/532904"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=532903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=532903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=532903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}