Ireland: No time for 'sulking'
SPOTLIGHT: Ireland’s players have vowed there will be ‘no sulking’ during their efforts to bounce back from the disappointment of a first Dublin defeat in more than three years.
Andy Farrell’s men were seeking a 20th consecutive win at the Aviva Stadium before being beaten 23-13 by New Zealand in their biggest game of this month’s Autumn Nations Series.
Friday evening’s stop-start encounter failed to live up to its billing as the All Blacks deservedly triumphed thanks to six Damian McKenzie penalties and Will Jordan’s 37th try in 39 Tests.
Error-strewn Ireland, whose only previous home loss under head coach Farrell came against France in the 2021 Six Nations, will look to respond against Argentina on Friday before hosting Fiji and Australia.
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Prop Finlay Bealham said: “It was a disappointed dressing room. It’s always tough to lose at home.
“We got into a huddle and just said ‘no sulking’. We’ll get on with it and learn from the mistakes we made.
“We have an incredibly tough Test match next Friday and we’ll look to fix the stuff we can be better at.
“There’s still three games to go in this series, and we’ll dust ourselves off.
“We’re not feeling sorry for ourselves, we’ll analyse it properly and another big Test next week.”
Following a largely forgettable first half of limited action, Josh van der Flier’s 43rd-minute try looked to have ignited the contest.
Yet a series of mistakes and repeated infringements stifled Ireland as New Zealand recovered from the sin-binning of Jordie Barrett to regain the momentum and subdue the sold-out crowd.
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“They’re a world-class team with some unbelievable individuals,” said Bealham.
“Every time you play them you know it’s going to be an absolute war, and it was a war again. They were the better team on the night.
“They were really good in terms of ruck pressure, and we couldn’t get into our flow attack-wise.
“[I’m] confident [we can turn it around]. We’ve got world-class coaches, world-class players, and we want to analyse it properly and see where it went wrong and things we can improve on.
“I’m sure, knowing the group, we’ll fix a lot of that.”
Bealham was thrust into Ireland’s starting XV due to star tighthead Tadhg Furlong being sidelined by a hamstring strain.
The 33-year-old played the majority of the game after his replacement Tom O’Toole was forced off with a head injury shortly after coming off the bench.
“I got a mouthful of water and then unfortunately for Tom he went down and I knew I was back on,” said Bealham.
“It was a tough, tough game physically. I was blowing a bit at the end.”
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