Under a beautiful clear night sky in the Melbourne Cricket Ground, Ireland got their 1999 International Rules series off to a winning start. After the strains and controversy generated by the Graham Geraghty affair, the players and management returned their attentions to the primary business of the tour.

Flushed with the success of fending off a late, fierce Australian onslaught before a record crowd of 64,326 in one of the most famous stadia in the world, manager Colm O'Rourke, captain John McDermott and the team's star forward on the night, Ja Fallon, faced into the glare of the spotlight.

In answer to a question about the mood going into last night's match, given the context of the previous day, the Irish manager answered: "The mood was absolutely fantastic. Never was a team in better mood to play a game.

"The lads are elated," he said. "They played their hearts out for their country and got the reward. The scoring chances fell in favour of Australia and their use of the ball around the field was excellent, but they missed chances. Goals proved absolutely vital and there were very few goal chances around."

John McDermott reiterated a theme from earlier in the week: the extent to which the players were conscious of their surroundings. "It was a tremendous experience to play here under lights, on the most famous football ground in the world, never mind Australia. If you want to do it, this is the place."

Fallon felt that the Australians had improved since last year. "They're shooting a lot better and have tightened up at the back. They're faster and more mobile."

For the Australians, it was a frustrating night. Dermott Brereton, their coach, was rueful about the team's poor start which saw them plunge into arrears without registering a score. "Yeah that hurt us, 17-zip. But if you take it in context after that, we had a reasonable game once we settled down. But early on, we failed to come to terms with the ball, what they were doing to get away from us.

"I suppose when you look at the statistics and I've had a sweep through them, even though we gave them the lead, we went inside their 40 metres 65 times to 52 which suggest we went in there a lot more than they did."

He also spoke about the confusion surrounding Ireland's final goal, Ja Fallon's 70th-minute score. Such was the confusion that the scoreboard oscillated wildly between 64 and 70 at the end of the match before settling on the larger figure.

Ciaran McManus had been clattered by Shane Crawford and, as he was getting up, Ireland played the ball on for Fallon to send goalkeeper Silvagni the wrong way.

"I was of the understanding," said Brereton, "when the umpire asks someone to go off because of the blood rule and the player runs off, play continues. I think time should have been allowed for him to go off, but the Irish played on and the umpire (Andrew Coates) never pulled them up."

Jim Stynes, the assistant coach, was satisfied with proceedings up to a point, but conceded that there was a lot of work to do on accuracy with the round ball. Looking forward to next week, he dismissed the suggestion that in the light of the big crowd it was a mistake to bring the second test to Adelaide. "If there was only 20,000 here tonight you'd be saying `thank God it's going to Adelaide'. It's a national sport, you have to share it around."