Schmidt clarifies what happened to Sexton - who's doing 'quite well'

Joe Schmidt hopes Johnny Sexton will shake off a head injury in time for Ireland’s Guinness Six Nations trip to Italy.

British and Irish Lions fly-half Sexton lasted just 24 minutes of Ireland’s fraught 22-13 victory over Scotland at Murrayfield on Saturday.

The 33-year-old failed a Head Injury Assessment (HIA) and Joey Carbery came on, stepping up to set Keith Earls free for the winning score as Ireland hit back from last weekend’s 32-20 defeat to England.

Conor Murray, Stockdale and Earls all crossed for Ireland, with Carbery shrugging off an intercept pass that led to Sam Johnson’s try to set up his Munster team-mate Earls for the winner.

Schmidt admitted Ireland fell flat in their build-up to their England defeat, but was pleased and relieved to report greater buoyancy and urgency in Edinburgh.

“There was definitely a rise in temperature, definitely a rise in energy, from last week,” said Schmidt.

“You’ve got to have a lot of energy when you make as many tackles as we did in the first half.

“Now we’ve got to make sure we kick on from here. We’re relying on other people now, but the one thing we don’t have to rely on other people for is how we approach things and how we perform.”

Gregor Townsend took responsibility for Scotland’s defeat, admitting his side’s attack slipped off in the second half.

“Just that final piece, the execution off set-piece, that fell off the jigsaw today, and that’s my fault,” said Townsend, who confirmed full-back Stuart Hogg suffered a shoulder injury.

“I’m the attack coach, and we weren’t able to get those two or three phases either to get in behind the defence or set up our set plays.”

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