Ireland 17 South Africa 12  This was no fluke. This was a major scalp and a deserved one. When you saw the tears rolling down the cheeks of Brian O'Driscoll, normally a relaxed, chirpy and chatty soul before a game, and John Hayes, who scarcely ever shows any emotion, you knew Ireland were up for it.

"It must have been a fly in my eye," said Hayes, laughing off any suggestion that Bruff farmers get all emotional over a game of rugby. Hayes maintained it was the memory of Ireland underperforming in Bloemfontein and Cape Town which had been the catalyst for their performance on Saturday but though they weren't saying it, one would venture also that Jake White repeating his dismissive comments of last summer was also a factor.

In any event, it was controlled fury, excellently channelled. Ireland took the game to the Boks from the off, set the tempo, drew the lines in the sand and led all the way. The pack didn't make an awful lot of headway early on, seeing a couple of lineout drives rebuffed, but the scrum held up well until changes in the last 10 minutes left CJ van der Linde utilising his three-stone advantage over Marcus Horan.

But the lineouts were varied and, using Simon Easterby or occasionally Malcolm O'Kelly off the tail, more dynamic, sucking in the Springboks' back row.

Nor were Ireland shy of going central or wide with set-piece moves which bore a profound Eddie O'Sullivan influence, really asking questions of the Springboks' defence. Pulling the strings was Ronan O'Gara but, whether by accident or design, no one made more hard yards than Shane Horgan through midfield. Horgan was simply immense, and this was where Ireland truly started to make winning inroads.

Ireland's efforts with the ball deserved more than one try off O'Gara's quick-witted tap and go, but it led to plenty of territory and scores.

Geordan Murphy and Horgan may have run into proverbial Bok brick walls past the half-hour, but O'Gara simply retreated into the pocket and slotted a drop goal for an 8-3 interval lead.

Three times South Africa should have been penalised for offside in the opening jousts but when Paddy O'Brien finally alerted referee Paul Honiss to Johann van Niekerk lurking lazily in front of the hindmost foot - albeit way off the ball - for O'Gara to make it 11-3, it had followed Ireland's best spell of continuity in the game.

It had started from Murphy counter-attacking inside halfway and was given significant impetus by first Johnny O'Connor, then Anthony Foley, Paul O'Connell and Malcolm O'Kelly (twice). With O'Driscoll's influence growing, it was the captain's strength and leg-pumping charge, and later Marius Joubert's high tackle off the ball on him, which led to an O'Gara brace of penalties.

To not press home the subsequent 17-6 advantage, and lapse into protect-what-we-have mode (typified by safety-first restarts) can perhaps be partly attributed to the sudden realisation of what they might be about to achieve. But this was offset handsomely by the defensive effort which saw them keep their line intact.

A word on O'Connor here. Aside from patrolling the number 10 channel, and making more tackles than any other player, he slowed down the Boks' ruck ball and, with Simon Easterby, generally made an utter nuisance of himself at the breakdown.

Johnny O'Concrete alright. There couldn't have been a better way to end the first half than by repelling another attack, all the more so in the way O'Connor unceremoniously dumped John Smit to the ground and earned a relieving penalty for not releasing.

The defence was far more aggressive than last summer, pushing up to deny the Springboks space, and then out, with the last man trusting those inside to plug any gaps - which they did. In perhaps Mike Ford's finest day as defensive coach, the number of ball-and-all tackles limited the Boks' to just eight offloads in the tackle all day. Amid the strikingly even match statistics, one exception stands out - missed tackles: Ireland six, South Africa 18.

Key moments? As in wins of this magnitude there were many. O'Gara's smart thinking for the try is an obvious one, but a significant factor in that was the manner in which Shane Byrne, who came up with several big plays, had the presence of mind to spin Smit into touch by the corner flag after Victor Matfield had pilfered a close-in Irish throw, thereby maintaining the pressure. The penalty from which O'Gara scored his try followed from the next play.

With understandable bitterness, both Smit and White refered to the referee saying "tell your players" of his warning as a key turning point and, in White's mind, another was Bakkies Botha's failure to give what seemed a try-scoring pass to Breyton Paulse or the many overlaps they squandered midway through the first half. But, playing the last man out, Ireland back their drift defenders on the inside to plug the gap.

Besides, Ireland missed a few try-scoring chances of their own as well. The eighth-minute setpiece move from which O'Gara skipped the decoy inside run of O'Driscoll to find Horgan, and his pass back inside for blindside wing Denis Hickie to hit the line at an angle was a superbly conceived attack which only failed because of the most marginal of forward passes.

At least Honiss was being consistent, for a striking feature of the game was the number of forward passes which he and his touch judges called - bucking the trend of the modern game.

That eighth-minute move had been the springboard for some of the most inventive back-line rugby and set-piece moves one can remember Ireland employing for quite some time.

There were so many big performances. Byrne's throwing and big plays. The solid scrum. O'Kelly seemed to be everywhere, and O'Connell was Johnsonesque again. Anthony Foley even decorated his customary work-rate and hard running with some shimmies and Hickie has never looked so strong in defence.

Few wins, maybe only Twickenham, will have given them more satisfaction. Another huge step forward for this team.

Onward and upward again.