On then, to December 20th and the meeting with Italy. The very date of it shows how ill-timed and ill-conceived this fixture is. That an international friendly coincides with a full round of first division games in England merely hammers home the point. Like it, lump it, Irish rugby is going to have to start living with the times.

Nowadays, roughly two-thirds of the Irish team (or 13 out of Sunday's 21-man squad) are professionals based in England. Their clubs are their chief employers, and international friendlies should be arranged accordingly.

One only has to look at football for a direct comparison. Mick McCarthy, and before him Jack Charlton, had to have a flexible attitude with regard to the availability of some of their players - especially for friendlies. They also understood the need to have a healthy working relationship with English club managers and if a player was carrying an injury then McCarthy or Charlton took the view that it was better not to exacerbate the problem.

Admittedly, the Irish selectors will not be calling on Nick Popplewell or Ross Nesdale for the game against Italy in deference to Newcastle's European Conference semi-final that weekend. Yet, in truth, London Irish's Premiership game against Bristol is more important in the longterm, and by extension all the other English league games.

Ultimately, the IRFU and the Irish management are going to have to adopt even more of a give-and-take view. As it is, the English clubs were effectively sidelined for a month by England's four-game autumnal meeting with the southern hemisphere teams. Realistically, the IRFU should be looking to have their games coincide with England's. After all, the FAI have had to pick their international match dates to coincide with these "free weekends".

Even if the English clubs do not successfully challenge their legal obligation to release their Irish players for the game against Italy, and even if London Irish are entitled to a postponement of their game against Bristol, bad working relationships with the English clubs won't serve Irish rugby in the long run.

By the same token, the head-in-the-sand, oldstyle nationalistic hostility toward London Irish won't do Irish rugby any favours either. It betrays a sense of panic in certain established quarters about the exodus of players abroad.

True, London Irish are an English-based club run as a business in the English game. But they are a friend abroad, they have provided Sunbury as a base for Munster and Ireland (and will again before the Italian game). Good working relationships between Brian Ashton and Willie Anderson on the one hand, and the IRFU and Sunbury on the other, are mutually beneficial.

Like it or lump it, Malcolm O'Kelly, Kieron Dawson and even Mark McCall are better players for being with London Irish. (Victor Costello is the exception rather than the rule). Ditto the four Irish Lions and many more besides. How could even the outrageously talented Eric Miller have made such rapid strides in the past year had he not been coached by Bob Dywer, and trained with the likes of Dean Richards, Martin Johnson and Neil Back?

Like it or lump it, Irish rugby is going to have start dovetailing their autumn friendlies with England. In fact, Brian Ashton would have been better served had Ireland filled the same four Saturdays in a row, or at least three of them, rather than spread them out over six weekends. To maximise the time which the international squad gets together, another game next Saturday would have been preferable.

Instead, each time the squad has come together, they've had to part company again for a week or two. And whatever the logistical difficulties, the absence of Australia and South Africa from Ireland's fixture list this past month must be regarded as a wasted opportunity.

The notion that Ireland shouldn't be playing these powers, and so shouldn't have shared the same pitch with the All Blacks, is a nonsense. You can only learn from playing the best. Each of the new caps in that game benefited enormously from the experience, as was shown against Canada.

The net result is that although Ashton has a shortfall in truly experienced internationals, several players have come on from their meetings with the Kiwis and now there are some unexpected options emerging.

Much as Ross Nesdale's phenomenal workrate will keep Keith Wood honest, so Victor Costello's rejuvenation will be good for Miller.

As for the full-back slot, it's ironic to think that Conor O'Shea was playing some of the best rugby of his life until he was cruelly sidelined for the last two games by a broken arm, yet in the immediate term O'Shea probably won't regain his place at the expense of Kevin Nowlan. The latter's pace, slight unorthodoxy and mental coolness serve him well and he is clearly revelling in his new-found environs.

There has been some carping about the performance of Kieron Dawson. True, he got his lines mixed up and missed a couple of tackles, and threw out two loose passes to Kevin Maggs. But Dawson has good hands and is Ireland's one truly quick, genuine number seven (an essential for this team) on the horizon, save for the possible exception of the currently injured and untried Dylan O'Grady.

There are also some misgivings about the Mark McCall-Rob Henderson partnership. But then, there always were, given both are inside centres. But why stick rigidly to an inside-outside partnership, with Henderson outside McCall? Watching McCall dummy to his left and take on ball up the middle into a forest of Canadian juggernauts, the thought occurred that Ireland are not getting the best out of Henderson. Taking the ball up the middle, after all, is his forte.

In the long term, Jonathan Bell will surely come into the midfield equation, and maybe Maggs. Unless Bell makes a sudden, compelling return to action, then the back line could remain en bloc against Italy. Up front, Reggie Corrigan and Keith Wood will probably come in for Popplewell and Nesdale; while Miller may also return for Costello.

Collectively, the whole wasn't always as good as the sum of the individual parts. But this was always going to take time, and it will get better. Indeed, it got distinctly better after the interval team talk, which had concentrated on speeding up ruck ball.

This revolved around more popped passes to runners standing off than forwards picking up and going; with forwards also made aware of the need to go to ground quicker. It brought about the requisite improvement.

Ashton has a vision that is about the best option Irish rugby has at the moment. All in all, things are progressing about as quickly as could reasonably be expected. After all, Rome wasn't built in a day. Cue to Bologna.