Skipper William Porterfield believes Ireland cannot afford to dwell on Tuesday's 201-run mauling at the hands of South Africa's big-game batsmen in Hobart with some more manageable prey about to enter the crosshairs.
Ireland shipped 411 runs, their highest total conceded in a One-Day International, with Hashim Amla taking full advantage of Ed Joyce’s failure to hold on to a routine chance at mid-wicket when he was on 10 to top-score with a quite brilliant 159.
Faf du Plessis also filled his boots, scoring 109 and putting on 247 for the second wicket with Amla, as South Africa lived up to their billing as the most potent of batting line-ups with their second straight score of 400-plus in the competition.
Damage limitation in a bid to protect net run rate was the main priority in the reply, but South Africa's speedsters Kyle Abbott (four for 21) and Dale Steyn (two for 39) put an end to those hopes as Ireland were reduced to 48 for five in the 11th over.
Andrew Balbirnie (58) and Kevin O'Brien (48) at least took the ugly look off the scorecard, with late runs from George Dockrell (25) and Max Sorensen (22) getting Ireland to 210 before Dockrell was last man out to give Morne Morkel figures of three 34.
South Africa's three frontline quicks ended with nine wickets for 94 runs from 25 overs in contrast to Ireland's seamers shipping 223 runs from 20 overs with a wicket each for John Mooney, who impressed with the new ball yet again, and Kevin O'Brien, whose seven overs cost 95 runs.
In contrast, Ireland’s three spinners conceded 187 from their full allocation of 30 overs, with young Andy McBrine returning to the side and providing the highlight of the bowling display with the wickets of the world’s number one and number two batsmen in the space of three deliveries as Amla and AB de Villiers (24) holed out to catches. They’ll talk long of such heroics in Donemana.
Longer than Ireland will of the defeat, with Zimbabwe looming into view on Saturday in Hobart and presenting a real chance to get back on the path to qualification for the quarter-finals.
The heavy nature of the defeat sees Ireland drop to fourth in the Pool B standings behind the West Indies on net run rate, although Ireland have a game in hand.
A win against Zimbabwe would end the African side’s hopes of qualifying and Porterfield insisted that will be the sole focus once the squad cross the Bass Strait to Tasmania.
“You’ve got to put it behind yourself pretty quickly as the tournament’s back-end fixtures come pretty quickly for ourselves,” said Porterfield.
“Now we’ve got to obviously take what we can from this game and move forward to there and obviously two points up for grabs, and it’s a pretty big two points for us.
“If we pick up two points, then we’re on six, and then we move into the India game, but we’re going to prepare for Hobart as we have every other game and look at them and everything we need to do and improve on this game and keep doing the good things we’re doing well.”
Ireland will also hope that both India and South Africa can keep up their winning ways, with the world champions taking on West Indies in Perth on Friday, while the Proteas take on Pakistan at Eden Park in Auckland on Saturday.
Even still Ireland will probably need two more wins from their remaining games against Zimbabwe, India and Pakistan as the West Indies finish their Pool B campaign against the UAE.
