Ireland's free fall culminated in a resounding thud on Saturday, the team finally languishing in eighth and last place in the SANZAR Invitational Under-21 Championship after a fourth defeat in five matches. Players and management alike decried the mitigating factors which saw only two backs fit enough to make the replacement bench.
Flu had ravaged the resources already cut to the bare bone by injury. Several of the starting line-up would not have played had there been an alternative. Yet for all the hardship off the pitch this was yet another match in which defeat was snatched from the jaws of victory: once again Ireland self destructed.
One error after another, a theme for this tournament in an Irish context, allowed Argentina to avenge their Pool defeat suffered at Irish hands: the home side could not believe their good fortune as Ireland donated three of Argentina's four tries. But what will be of more concern in the long term is that in 400 plus minutes of rugby Ireland managed to score only two tries. There have been some fine individual performances behind the scrum in the tournament, pointedly Bryn Cunningham, Shane Horgan, David Quinlan, Mark McHugh and Kieron Campbell, but the back play has been substandard. Up front some of the more senior players struggled due to fatigue, injury, and loss of form.
Other emerged as core performers. Donnacha O'Callaghan, and props Stephen Baretto and Simon Best deserve great credit for different reasons. O'Callaghan was arguably Ireland's player of the tournament, his commitment and willingness to match the physical intensity of his opponent's an example to those who aspire to play at this level.
Despite the collective disappointment there were some decent performances on Saturday, especially those from Des Dillon - he grabbed Ireland's try - McHugh, Leo Cullen (nobody has toiled more than the Irish captain) and Paul Neville. Despite a lack of success on the field, Ireland must go away and learn from the experience. Elsewhere on the final day of the tournament, South Africa overturned a 25-13 deficit to beat New Zealand 27-25 in a thrilling finale, scoring a converted try in injury time to shatter the New Zealand Colts. Australia beat France 38-19 and Wales beat England 19-17 in the other matches.
Scoring sequence: 4 mins: McHugh penalty 0-3; 10 mins: LeCot try, Nannini conversion, 7-3; 13 mins: Freixas try, 12-3; 15 mins: McHugh penalty, 12-6; 27 mins: Nannini penalty, 15-6; 34 mins: Moore drop goal, 15-9; 38 mins: McHugh penalty, 15-12; 46 mins: Dillon try, McHugh conversion, 15-19; 55 mins: McHugh penalty, 15-22; 60 mins: Van der Ghote try, 2022; 71 mins: penalty try, Nannini conversion, 27-22; 83 mins: Nannini penalty, 30-22.
ARGENTINA: F Leonelli; F Serra, M Gaitan, P Garcia Hamilton, M Nannini; J Freixas, A Querol (capt); D Rodriguez, F LeCot, F Cane Herrera; G Miranda, I Miranda; S Boffeli, C Ayala, J Farias. Replacements: S Van der Ghote for Serra 58 mins; J Ramos for Farias 73 mins; J Sabatte for Ayala 79 mins.
IRELAND: B Cunningham (Bective Rangers); A Dunne (Old Belvedere), K Hartigan (Garryowen), S Moore (UCD), T Keating (Blackrock College); M McHugh (St Mary's College), S Keogh (Old Belvedere); S Baretto (Terenure College), A Flavin (London Irish), S Best (Newcastle); D O'Callaghan (Cork Constitution), R Casey (Blackrock College); D Dillon (UCD), L Cullen (Blackrock College, capt), P Neville (Garryowen).
Replacements: A O'Brien (UCD) for Best 30 mins; M O'Driscoll (UCC) for Casey half-time; A Kearney (UCD) for Cullen 66 mins; J Flannery (UCC) for Flavin 70 mins.
Referee: G Hinton (Australia).
