ON RUGBY:Yes, the All Blacks are a superior force and Ireland have a lot of catching up to do, but the IRFU are operating on the right lines in investing more in less

SO, THEY came, they saw and they conquered, pretty much as you expected they would. It’s hard not to marvel at them a little bit. Sure, they defend their line with a desire matched by their cynicism, but that’s for referees to deal with. Once more it was an education and thanks to them as well as Ireland, the mausoleum became a colosseum.

Hence this week’s video review will be the most invaluable for Ireland this season. Every mistake – restart receptions, turnovers or defensive blips – was punished and at an intensity these Irish players rarely encounter.

Tellingly, even Brian O’Driscoll admitted immediately afterwards the first 15 or 20 minutes were played at a pace he had not experienced in ages.

So can an Irish team ever have the skills to take on an All Blacks at this tempo, and any time soon? It’s possibly no co-incidence Australia are closest to New Zealand because they play them the most, witness their recent win in Hong Kong after 10 successive defeats (and helped by Dan Carter being taken off prematurely). If Ireland played the All Blacks four times a year they’d have a better chance of breaking that 105-year winless column.

While the jury has always been out on Ireland’s four-try salvo when well beaten with 14 men in June, continuing on from the relatively bloodless coup in Croke Park in 2008, Saturday’s showing was encouraging.

After all, Ireland are coming from a long way back, in terms of the contrasting playing approach in the two countries as well as the two hemispheres. Critically, too, the All Blacks have been playing with the law amendments for the best part of two years, through two Super 14 and two Tri Nations and now a second end-of-season tour.

Perhaps just as pertinently, as Graham Henry remarked afterwards, conditions in the Southern Hemisphere – even in the Land of the Long White Cloud – are more conducive to this ball-in-hand game, and cited last Tuesday’s Munster-Australia match in a torrential Thomond downpour as proof.

One could add the schools’ game in Ireland places far too much importance on winning. Once in a while, a side such as CBC Monkstown three years ago or Blackrock College on 2008 break the mould, but otherwise there is too great an emphasis on one or a handful of knock-out games per year.

The Irish game also needs more John Hayes, Shane Horgans, Trevor Brennans, Alan Quinlans, Niall Ronans, Seán O’Briens and their ilk from the youths/club game.

All that said and done, whenever Ireland meet New Zealand it’s still 15 v 15, and in terms of circumventing this gulf in quality and quantity underneath the elite tier, less can also be more. And to this end the IRFU have a good system in place.

Admittedly, the five Super 14 sides in New Zealand are underpinned by a quasi professional provincial championships whereas the AIL is under-used and under-funded, but in Ireland, there are four professional, provincial sides underpinned by four provincial academies.

Certainly compared to the dozen or 14 professional outfits stretched out in England or France, with their different coaches, owners, demands and comparatively unrestricted overseas imports, the IRFU and Irish rugby can invest more in less, and this starts with identifying and improving talent with the best possible coaching at an earlier age. It would appear Munster’s academy is catching up with Leinster’s, where there has been a greater degree of co-operation with the elite schools than previously.

In the shorter-term, aside from the Declan Kidney factor (which is still valid) this Ireland team have it in their armoury to quicken their game further, to improve their support play/offloading and their counter-attacking.

They could play Peter Stringer from the start rather than as an impact player. There are damned lies and statistics, but consider this: since his debut in 2000, whenever Stringer has been in the Irish team their winning ratio has been 69 per cent. Without him, that drops to 46 per cent.

After a two-year blip in performance, when his form suffered for being banished to the stands during the 2007 World Cup and then Tomás O’Leary’s emergence later that season at Munster, he has rediscovered his best.

It would surely be a chance wasted not to perm him with Jonathan Sexton once in this international window when, eh, entertaining Argentina this Sunday. The changed emphasis in the laws has seen the game come back to him, and his presence might also help with nagging leadership issues.

As Liam Toland noted in these pages yesterday, twice in quick succession during the second half Tommy Bowe made half-breaks and, as he does, freed his arms in the tackle, looked over his left shoulder, but found no one there. Given most of these players have been training and playing with Bowe for a few years now, it would not be unreasonable for someone to anticipate this.

Geordan Murphy has always run the best trailers of any Irish fullback and this is something Rob Kearney needs to add. Kearney has excellent catching, kicking and running skills as well as his physical strength and speed, and the aerial ping-pong of a few years ago was made for his strengths but in the modern game the fullback should almost be a team’s most potent attacking player.

In Kearney’s defence, there isn’t the work-rate in retreat a la the All Blacks to give him counter-attacking options and it was encouraging to see him offload twice last Saturday, even if one went to ground (Thanks to Jamie Heaslip’s presence of mind and Brian O’Driscoll’s brilliance it led to a try).

To what degree the team’s structure allows him to do so is a moot point, but he could do worse than pore through the DVD of Mils Muliaina’s latest master-class, not least in his willingness to get on the ball and hit the line.

If not Murphy, then Keith Earls will have to play fullback on Sunday, with Andrew Trimble likely to get another run. There’s a strong argument for trying Mike Ross against the ever-potent Pumas scrum (not to do so could also be a wasted opportunity), a more leftfield one for giving Ian Nagle a go and a likelier one for granting Seán O’Brien another start. But, understandably, the core of the side will be wheeled out again. Ireland need to carry on in the same vein, but they also need a win.