So what if it wasn’t pretty – we got the win, we got the points difference, and in my opinion, we also got a valuable lesson about the way our team should play.
Luke Fitzgerald is a natural talent. He has the potential to be every bit the player Shane Williams is if not more, since he is just as much at home at centre as he is on the wing. So why the hell do both Leinster and Ireland seem to be going out of their way to avoid giving him the ball???
Now I’m not one to pat myself on the back when I make a correct sports prediction…
Yeah, I couldn’t get away with that last sentence, could I? Especially since I am SO going to pat myself on the back…
When O’Gara went off the pitch with his yellow card on the half hour mark, I predicted that Luke would score a try while he was gone. Why? Because there was bound to be more central opportunities for him with only six behind the scrum, that’s why.
And lo and behold, who was there to take the pass from Stephen Ferris for the all important second try?
Then in the second half, he was carted back out on the wing, and he had to use his own intuition to create the chance for the score which put the result beyond doubt.
Now hear this, Messrs Kidney and Cheika –FITZGERALD IS A TRY-SCORING MACHINE and he MUST be included in your offensive strategy more often. It’s been all very well up to now, but with big games coming up against England, Wales and further down the line Harlequins, it would be a crying shame to see his kit continuously unspoiled.
I mean, if you had to nitpick at the result from Rome yesterday, you’d say that we had to rely on interceptions and opportunism for the five-pointers we got, so the result could have been very different.
Yes, I know that Masi should have been redcarded for his shocking clothesline tackle on Kearney in the first minute, but as it turned out it was better he stayed on the pitch because it gave us a better sense of how this team plays together fifteen on fifteen.
I would also suggest that Kidney admits that the Paddy Wallace at centre experiment just hasn’t worked. Every time I remember him with the ball it was as though he grasped it in desperation and closed his eyes waiting for contact. He even got himself a shiner to prove just how effective that policy is.
If the coaching brains trust doesn’t believe Luke is ready to partner Drico in the centre, then surely Gordon d’Arcy is ready for battle by now?
And if provincial inclusion is the problem, there is plenty of Ulster contribution in Ferris and Bowe – I wouldn’t replace either – and if your man Tom Court can play at No3 then I’d be more than happy to leave John Healy stranded on 91 caps because he appears to be addicted to giving away needless penalties.
Maybe it’s also time to swap the Munster scrum-halfs back around and let Stringer start…it could be argued that O’Leary’s poor distribution is one of the reasons the ball isn’t making it as far as our pacy wingers more often.
When all is said and done, we’ve four points, we’re top of the pile, and with a few tweaks here and there, we’ll have the English shaking in their boots in a fortnight. We have to start believing that we can actually win this thing, and to do that we can’t rely on the opposition handing us easy scores.
Click the headline beneath the photo for RTE's official writeup
