Post-match dissertations are a matter of perspective but on Saturday afternoon in the bowels of Murrayfield's West stand, there was a consensus among the Ireland players, an acknowledgement that indiscipline had almost cost them a Triple Crown.

The players were at pains to point out the final margin of victory was little surprise to them, that the pre-match hype was not something to which they had subscribed.

"We always knew it was going to be tough," said David Wallace. "People were saying it was going to be an easy game for us but we had no doubt it was going to be tough. We had seen what Scotland can do at home last season: great wins against England and France.

"Their last game against Italy was an anomaly. We were under no illusions about what way the game was going to go and that they would bounce back. It was an extremely tough game. You have to give credit to Scotland; their defence was good and they were solid in the tackle."

While the Irish players chose to be gracious winners, praising the Scottish effort, the one bugbear was discipline. Chris Paterson is the most accomplished place-kicker in the Six Nations this season. The issue had been addressed in the Irish team talk, yet the tendency to infringe almost cost them the win.

"For (most) of their points we only had ourselves to blame," conceded Wallace. "We were very indisciplined."

Denis Hickie elaborated: "We probably made it a bit easier for them with our indiscipline and we fluffed a few chances we would usually take. We are very annoyed with ourselves - not to take anything away from Scotland - but we had said not to give them any chance to keep the scoreboard ticking over . . . But we didn't do that; we gave away silly penalties; more frustrating because we said we weren't going to do that."

The good news was the way Ireland responded in the closing stages; hanging on to the ball and forcing the Scots to transgress suggested a maturing team with growing self-belief. It might have been less than pretty, and there were plenty of areas that lacked the fluency and precision of the win over England, but having half dug their grave, Ireland clambered to safer ground.

"Performance is the buzz-word after a match like that," explained Gordon D'Arcy. "We kept the ball for long periods and then got a little bit giddy when we should have just retained it. The performance wasn't polished by any stretch of the imagination. We started well in the first half and looked like we were wearing them down and then we started badly in the second half and let them back in. They got their tails up.

"When things were going badly for us, to turn that around and get those two penalties to go back in front and hold on is a good sign of mental toughness. We wanted to replicate the performances that we managed against France and England.

"We probably played better against France when we lost but it's important that good teams win even when playing poorly. We are going to be very disappointed with ourselves for giving away those six penalties. Our defence is good enough to not have to give away those penalties."

D'Arcy was quick to stress the relatively muted response to the presentation of the silver salver in no way reflected lack of regard for the achievement: "Just because we have won it two years in a row doesn't take away from the achievement. The reason we weren't jumping around is because we want to do better than we did out there. It's about standards and we set our own. We know we didn't live up to them . . . that's why we weren't jumping around. As a team we are delighted to win the Triple Crown. It's a huge achievement in any one season to beat those three teams."

Hickie, who missed those previous two Triple Crown wins, concurred.

"I was delighted to be involved today," said the man of the match. "I don't think Irish rugby is so far ahead of itself that Triple Crowns don't mean anything. We made no secret of the fact that we wanted to go for the Grand Slam this year. Obviously we're still in the championship."

Indeed they are after England's victory at Twickenham yesterday.

Travelling to Rome to face an Italian team coming off successive victories is no bagatelle. Standards will have to rise appreciably.