It had all been set fair. As the week wore on, the sun continued to shine and tens of thousands of rugby fans from both countries descended on Chicago in increasing numbers. All manner of former Irish internationals from different eras were part of the jaunts and the junkets.
Some supporters paid extraordinary numbers to be there, and for the majority of the Irish in the 62,000 sell-out attendance who travelled from this island and far afield, the adventure did not come cheap.
The American sports market has long been rugby’s great mirage and on Friday the chief executives of World Rugby (Alan Gilpin), the IRFU (Kevin Potts) and NZ Rugby (Mark Robinson) held court to discuss the countdown to the 2031 World Cup in the USA and plans for Ireland and the All Blacks to play there each year until then.
Are Ireland sliding down rugby's global pecking order?
Potts spoke of attending a function with 600 Irish-American businessmen who met with the Irish players earlier on Friday and of tapping into the 40 million Irish diaspora. And then came the match.
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Only time will tell whether it was more deflating for the IRFU’s intended sorties to the US – be it Chicago, Boston or wherever – or for the Ireland rugby team over the next month and beyond.
Soldier Field is the smallest and oldest stadium in the NFL, and its primary tenants, the Chicago Bears, are relocating to a new stadium further out in Arlington Heights. Suffice to say the Stadium looks the exact same as in 2016 and the pitch is even worse than it was then.
Hence the sight of groundsmen shovelling sand on to the various potholes after the warm-up, with another spraying green paint on said patches.
Then, with the clock on 2 minutes 46 seconds, the TMO Ian Tempest advised referee Pierre Brousset of the need for him to review in incident of potential foul play, namely when Beauden Barrett and Tadhg Beirne collided.
Only then did the officials discover that Tempest’s television feed was different from the feed on the big screens, one of which Brousset and his ARs, Karl Dickson and Luc Ramos, looked at plaintively before being advised to look at a pitch side monitor on halfway.
As the crowd’s patience wore thin, eventually Brousset and co determined that Beirne be given a yellow card pending a review for it to be upgraded. That decision took four minutes and 45 seconds. So, over seven-and-half minutes after the kick-off, there had been two minutes and 46 seconds of rugby. How to kill an atmosphere.
Furthermore, Brousset was not mic’d up to the crowd and the lack of communication for many among the 62,000 capacity was infuriating, not least when Beirne’s yellow card was ridiculously upgraded to a red by the FPRO Dan Jones.
Most risibly, on the half-hour, Brousset informed the Irish players: “number five, HIA”, ie the already red carded Beirne. You couldn’t make it up.
Long into the night at The Gage on South Michigan Avenue, on a straw poll of circa 30 or 40 Irish fans, none of them said they would be inclined to repeat the experience.
So, given the USA Eagles were beaten 85-0 by Scotland in Murrayfield on Saturday, and given Major League Rugby has shrunk from its all-time high of 13 teams in the 2022 season to just seven currently, this was not an especially encouraging augury for the 2031 World Cup.
Of course, the result coloured the experience for the Irish supporters present and the game itself was also a far cry from that 40-29 belter in 2016, never mind the 2023 World Cup quarter-final epic.
That tournament felt like Irish rugby’s Icarus Moment. It was probably the peak point of the greatest Irish rugby team ever, never to be repeated, and this second additional defeat to the All Blacks was perhaps further confirmation of that.
Which is not to say that this team cannot add more Six Nations titles, or break through that quarter-final glass ceiling with a more favourable draw – and reviewing last Saturday’s 26-13 loss only compounded the conflicting interpretations of the performance.
There were mitigating factors in the rustiness and the Beirne red card. The lineout wobbles and breakdown inaccuracies are fixable. Much of the kicking, not least from Jamison Gibson-Park, and chasing were of a high order.
The power play for the try with 14 men was a highlight. Jack Crowley had some wayward kicks from hand, and his array of attacking grubbers and chips within 30 metres of the opposition line didn’t earn a return. But with Stuart McCloskey adding to the offloading, it demonstrated some new attacking variety.
Ireland fired more shots, if not hugely, than in losing 23-13 a year ago, but ultimately 13 points was again not enough. They needed to convert one of those half-chances, be it McCloskey’s intended offload for Jamie Osborne, or the latter not holding on to Crowley’s pass nearing the hour in the game’s pivotal spell.
For the first hour or so as well, Ireland defended with good line speed and accuracy, palpably frustrating the All Blacks save for that trademark coast-to-coast try finished off by the brilliant Ardie Savea. Whereupon they cut loose.
The All Blacks only forced Ireland to make 47 tackles in the first half, but keeping the ball in hand and applying more width and temp after the break, that tally rose to 152 by the end, with Ireland missing 24 as the effort took its toll.
The All Blacks had the better of the possession overall (56 per cent), but in the last 10 minutes this rose to 88 per cent. Admittedly, with their lack of game time, more than ever Ireland’s best chance of winning lay in leading from the front, not playing catch-up. Cue Bundee Aki’s pass not hitting Jamie Osborne or James Lowe on his outside from a defensive five-metre scrum in the preamble to Cam Roigard sidestepping over for the All Blacks final try.
Even so, the men in black were queuing up when a fifth try was ruled out for a marginal forward pass with the game’s last play, otherwise it would have been 33-13.
That felt like a chilling blast from the past. As Andy Farrell observed afterwards, the next three weeks will now tell us much about this team and what the future may look like.
