Tonga 22 Ireland 20:IRELAND COACH Andy Kelly is hoping Samoa can throw his side a World Cup lifeline after their opening Pool C game ended in heartbreaking defeat.

Kelly's side played their part in a memorable match as they went down 22-20 to Tonga at Parramatta Stadium. The lead changed hands six times before Esikeli Tonga pounced for the decisive try seven minutes from the end to spark wild scenes of joy from the star-studded Island team.

Ireland were quarter-finalists in 2000 and they could yet go further in this year's tournament if Samoa win the South Pacific derby in Penrith on Friday. That would set up a deciding group match between the Samoans and Ireland back at Parramatta on Wednesday week for a place in the semi-final qualifier with the Pool B winners.

"It's hard to articulate how proud I am," said Kelly. "The request for the fellas was to stand in front of a juggernaut and I think they more than did that. They matched fire with fire. It's got to be disappointing to lose a game like that. You saw Tonga's elation.

"We were written off and there were some quite detrimental things said about whether we were physically up to challenging the Samoans and the Tongans. I hope we answered those questions. We played with a great deal of passion and pride. We didn't get the result but I think the guys in the next couple of days will recognise their efforts and see the positives.

"And we'll be ready if Samoa throw us a lifeline from the Penrith game. We've nine days to prepare and we've shown everybody we're good enough to challenge."

The outcome was tough on the brave Irish and especially winger Damien Blanch, whose hat-trick of tries was all in vain. "The guys are gutted." he said. "We may have a lifeline coming but we didn't really want to rely on that."

Ireland stood up to a ferocious onslaught by the bigger Tongan forwards and showed they can play football by matching their opponents try for try. In the end it came down to goalkicking, Pat Richards landing just two of his four conversion attempts on the ground where he made his NRL debut six years earlier.

For a long time it looked as though Tonga would pay the price for their indiscipline, the Irish scoring 14 of their points while the Islanders were down to 12 men.

English referee Steve Ganson awarded nine first-half penalties to Ireland and sent winger Tonga to the sinbin on 23 minutes for lying on in the tackle.

Ireland scored tries through Michael Platt and Blanch while Tonga was on the sidelines and Blanch added another after stand-off Feleti Mateo was also shown a yellow card on 48 minutes for dissent.

The relieved Tonga coach, Jim Dymock, was not surprised by the gutsy Irish performance and admitted his side need to improve their discipline to progress.

"Most of them have played in Super League," said the former London Broncos favourite. "They didn't surprise me at all. They came out and, to their credit, they gave it a go. I was up there praying at the end. I thought it was going to be the luck of the Irish but thankfully we came through and hopefully we can play better against Samoa. It was a tough game, especially to play 20 minutes with 12 men. Our discipline was a bit scratchy but we weren't used to some of the interpretations of the referee. Hopefully we can learn from that game."

TONGA: Talanoa, Vuna, Jennings, Uaisele, Tonga, Mateo, Taufa'ao, Kaufusi, Leo-Latau, Manuokafoa, L Paea, Fa'aoso, Manu.

Subs: Moa, Lauaki, Uasi, Williams.

IRELAND: Platt, Blanch, Gleeson, Littler, Richards, Grix, Fitzpatrick, O'Carroll, Beswick, Tandy, Harrison, Doran, Finnigan.

Subs: McIlorum, Finn, Haggerty, Cassidy.

Referee: S Ganson (England).