Green shoots of recovery

TO IRELAND the fabled Triple Crown, to Scotland the mythical and unwanted wooden spoon, but for long periods in Dublin yesterday, neither of these scenarios seemed likely. A 21-point defeat was less than justice. Scotland, despite that forbidding losing margin, did finally find the performance we had been waiting for all season and Ireland looked unlikely championship material as their visitors got stuck in with scant regard to reputation.

In the end, the Scots did not have enough in the locker to halt Ireland’s march to a first Triple Crown since 1985 and certainly no-one to match the brilliance of the centre pairing of Brian O’Driscoll and man-of-the-match Gordon D’Arcy, but it wasn’t through want of effort.

Territorially, Scotland dominated for long periods and only a lack of a cutting edge - and how often have we said that? - prevented the result from being a lot closer. There were heaps of positives, though, not least the fact that Glasgow’s Dan Parks justified the faith of coach Matt Williams to produce a display of poise and control at stand-off, while Chris Paterson looked far more lethal at full-back than at 10. Scott Murray produced one of his greatest performances at lock and, although they lost Simon Taylor to what was later diagnosed as a serious knee injury, the back row toiled like Trojans and scrum-half Chris Cusiter came out of his tussle with Peter Stringer with his burgeoning reputation enhanced.

The loudest sound in Dublin on the morning of yesterday’s match had been that of several thousand Irish chickens being counted. "Lambs to the Slaughter", said the man from RTE on the warm-up show while his studio pundit lampooned everything Scottish and questioned Matt Williams’ team selections, tactics, even seemingly his sanity. Paddy Power, the local bookie, had Ireland at 16-1 on, a ludicrous and insulting quote in a two-horse race while the capacity crowd on the way in plainly believed all Eddie O’Sullivan’s men had to do was don a green jersey and step out on to the pitch. All in all, as good as a team talk for Williams and his coaching staff and a fired-up Scotland duly got off to the best possible start when Cusiter and Allan Jacobsen conspired to charge down Ronan O’Gara’s painfully slow clearance. When Tom Philip took play to within five metres, the Irish defence gave away a penalty and Paterson coolly kicked the three points. Within a minute, however, Taylor came in at the side of a ruck on his own 22 and O’Gara put Ireland level.

Another penalty against Scotland when Jacobsen hung on too long in a tackle gave Ireland more territory in the opposition half. O’Driscoll brought his effervescent centre partner D’Arcy into play for the first time and received a resounding thump, possibly high, from Philip for his pains. The groggy Irish captain recovered after treatment and Gordon Bulloch then obstructed Reggie Corrigan at the next breakdown only for O’Gara, to a massive groan, to miss the chance to put his side ahead.

The pressure on the Scots, however, was mounting. A chip and chase by wing Shane Horgan forced Simon Webster to look sharp in his own in-goal area and then D’Arcy again probed up the left. The Scots defence held and they, too, began to put together some pleasing phases with Parks finally getting his backline moving.

But then came an Irish try right out of the O’Driscoll Book of Magic, with the Leinster sorcerer putting Girvan Dempsey into acres of space on the right with a sumptuous long pass. Horgan steamed up to take the full-back’s inside pass and when the ball was transferred to D’Arcy the find of the championship fairly scorched over.

But O’Gara missed the conversion attempt and Paterson kept his side in touch with a second penalty on 25 minutes when Malcolm O’Kelly coathangered Webster. But O’Gara made it 11-6 at once with his second penalty. Scotland were still creating chances, however, and Parks’s long, probing kick had Stringer scuttling back.

Scotland responded in style, with Parks running the ball out of his own 22 and Paterson and Philip taking play past half way where Ireland held on too long. Paterson, however, was narrowly wide with his penalty attempt.

But Scotland, fired by the splendid Parks, were playing with wit and craft. The stand-off forced Murphy, under severe pressure from Murray, to mark in the corner from a lofted kick and then stepped back into the pocket to drop a neat goal and make the score 11-9. Talk of Ireland winning by 15 points, let alone the 50 that would keep them nominally in the formula for the Six Nations championship, suddenly looked laughable and the second Irish try came against the run of play with O’Driscoll missing out Dempsey to put Murphy over in the corner. But O’Gara missed again and at the interval it remained 16-9.

Williams made his usual half-time substitution with Gavin Kerr coming on to replace Jacobsen, but then came an enforced change and a sight to sear Scottish hearts with Taylor down injured with what looked like a knee injury and Dr James Robson signalling for the stretcher at once.

Jon Petrie came on for his 28th cap and Scotland, to their credit, kept their spirits high with another succession of phases on the Irish 22 which ended gloriously with Ally Hogg diving exuberantly over the Irish line for his first international try, converted by Paterson. At 16-16, game on as they say.

But hereabouts referee Nigel Williams decided to take a hand in matters, penalising Scotland for some oblique offence at a breakdown, and marching them back 10 metres when Cusiter simply cleared the ball to touch. It gave Ireland an attacking opportunity they could not miss and, helped by missed tackles from Parks and Stuart Grimes, flanker David Wallace was allowed to twist over for a try converted by O’Gara.

Scotland, however, had found self-belief from somewhere and after another spell of intelligent probing, Grimes was stopped a yard short, his last action in the match as it turned out as he was immediately replaced by Nathan Hines with Mike Blair coming on for the hugely impressive Cusiter, who had totally outplayed the battle-hardened Stringer. But it was the tiny Munster terrier who got the fourth Irish try with referee Williams getting in the way of Henderson’s attempt at a tackle as the scrum-half darted over from close range.

With the score 30-16 in Ireland’s favour, it was time for the anticipated Scottish pantomime of Bruce Douglas going down injured - Oscar for that man - and Jacobsen coming back on - strange how often this scenario appears in current Scotland matches.

But Ireland’s riposte was simply to score another sublime try with D’Arcy cutting a swathe in the Scottish defence and taking a return from Murphy to run over for his second try.

O’Gara converted and it was time to party.