Job done. There were inaccuracies and missed chances galore in a first half which yielded only three Ian Madigan penalties; the 40 points that followed after the break were against opponents twice reduced to 14 men.
For nine minutes were even down to 13 men after one of their players had to go off injured and there were no more substitutes left to come on. Their coach Milton Haig called it “amateur night”, but it’s funny how often a dominant side only reaps its rewards late on.
So it was here as the replacements came on and feasted on visibly wilting opposition – Robin Copeland offloading out of the tackle to create the space for the first of Felix Jones's late brace, and Stuart Olding playing a key part in both of the full-back's scores before running in his first test try – as Ireland turned a 9-0 interval lead into a winning margin that covered the 41-point handicap. All those 139 Georgian tackles – 78 of them in the first half, and with a further 26 missed – took their toll, as did a 16-9 penalty count.
While a lack of cohesion was always likely given this was a remodelled team, the accuracy one normally associates with a Joe Schmidt team was missing. There were plenty of line breaks (14 in all), but poor, often rushed, passing, dropped balls and inexactness at ruck time prevented them from turning them into scores.
Perhaps this betrayed an understandable degree of anxiousness.
Naked aggression
Admittedly, the visitors were full of physical vim and vigour, but they made scant attempt to release after the tackle. Predictably, they also brought plenty of naked aggression, and, just as true to type, a potent scrum, as well as plenty of kicking.
A defensive glitch will give Les Kiss and Schmidt something else to get their teeth into, but on the plus side, Dave Kilcoyne provided some ballast, Dominic Ryan and Tommy O'Donnell showed up well with 11 tackles apiece and some good carries.
Having said that, the back-row operated a little individualistically. The lineout settled after an early wobble or two – with Dave Foley rightly earning the coach’s main plaudits for his calling and his carrying – and even the maul grew in potency. Craig Gilroy brought some hunger and work-rate, and Jones did little wrong.
Ian Madigan lit up the occasion with his sharp running, footwork and passing, which helped to pierce the Georgian defence. He place-kicked assuredly with an eight from 10 return for a 19-point haul, and even provided a counter-attacking dimension to Ireland’s game.
Not surprisingly, not all the 42,500 or so tickets were utilised, but there was still a remarkably healthy turn-out for a Sunday game against a tier-two nation. They were initially muted by the manner in which Georgia recycled the ball and carried hard to contact. The first of two scrum penalties against Mike Ross resulted in Merab Kvirikashvili missing the posts.
Georgia struggled more when the game loosened up, but all Ireland had to show for their increasing dominance were two out of three penalties by Madigan.
As Ireland elected to go to the corner and resort to their maul and close-in drives, Georgia relished such the challenge. They rolled their sleeves up and wrestled for their lives as they repelled the first two mauls before Ireland went to the corner with another kickable penalty.
Secondary cluster
The Irish pack stayed cohesively with the drive, although it splintered as the secondary cluster were held up short of the line before Eoin Reddan fed O’Donnell. The
Munster
man showed good upper body strength in bouncing two tackles but in reaching out for the line failed to keep the ball in hand. Compensation came by way of Madigan’s third penalty and the first of Georgia’s two yellow cards against scrum-half Giorgi Bregadze for not rolling away.
Not for the first time, a 15-minute interlude in the company of the Schmidt Brains Trust had a profound effect on an Irish team. Ireland resumed with greater intent, setting targets further, running with more depth and clearing out more efficiently. When they promptly went to their maul again, this time they set ensuing targets slightly further out and Kilcoyne came onto Reddan’s pass at depth to break two tackles for his first Test try.
There was no avoiding the primary war zone and even the Irish lineout maul rumbled over soon after for Richardt Strauss to plunge for a try which perhaps did more than any to break Georgia’s spirit. That said, Bregadze ran at Foley and Ryan and offloaded for their big lock Georgi Nemsadze to score with a fine out-and-in line.
Pummelled
After Dimitri Basilaia was binned, Ireland pummelled away to earn
Simon Zebo
a relative walk in, and with Lasha Malaguradze stretchered off as Madigan awaited the conversion, Ireland made hay.
Rodney Ah You and Robin Copeland carried hard before Olding put Jones over, and then won the ball from Copeland’s tackle to enable Kieron Marmion to initiate a counter-attack from the 22.
He linked with Ian Keatley before Sean Cronin’s reverse pass gave Jones a run-in, and Olding had the final say on the cutback from Keatley’s reverse pass to score with ease.
Even allowing for the nature of the miss-match at that stage, Olding undoubtedly has a touch of genuine class about him.
