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Ireland must deliver a 'better performance' to beat Scotland

By PA
Interim Ireland head coach Simon Easterby - PA

Interim boss Simon Easterby believes Ireland’s patchy performance in their bonus-point win over England will be insufficient for victory away to Scotland.

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The back-to-back Guinness Six Nations champions travel to Murrayfield on Sunday afternoon bidding to remain on course for an unprecedented third consecutive title.

Ireland launched their latest championship defence by overturning a 10-5 half-time deficit to comfortably dispatch Steve Borthwick’s side in Dublin, despite conceding two late tries amid defensive lapses in an eventual 27-22 success.

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A sizeable chunk of Easterby’s squad have never suffered defeat to the Scots, with the Irish having won 14 of the last 15 meetings, dating back to 2014, including 10 in a row.

Interim boss Easterby played down the significance of that statistic as he targets improvement against dangerous hosts who have regularly toppled France, England and Australia during the reign of head coach Gregor Townsend.

Six Nations

P
W
L
D
PF
PA
PD
BP T
BP-7
BP
Total
1
France
1
1
0
0
5
2
Scotland
1
1
0
0
5
3
Ireland
1
1
0
0
5
4
England
1
0
1
0
1
5
Italy
1
0
1
0
0
6
Wales
1
0
1
0
0

“We’re always continually trying to evolve and get better, as are Scotland and they showed that in the autumn, that they can mix it with the best, which they did really well,” said Easterby.

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“It (Ireland’s recent record against Scotland) is something that’s been spoken about outside of the camp but we’re just trying to focus on getting our own game in order, making sure that we deliver a better performance than we did against England because that’s what it will take to beat Scotland in Murrayfield.

“We know how hard they are up there.

“A lot of us have been there over the years as players and as coaches and certainly a good few years we didn’t have the same success that we’ve had in recent times.

“We know the motivation they’ll have – they won’t need any – but we’ve obviously got internal motivation this year in terms of what we’re trying to do.”

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C
CO 2 hours ago
Whose ship has sailed before the first All Blacks squad?

Based on last weekend there should be no Hurricanes loose forwards in the mix, they all seemed poor with the Brumbies once again fantastic at playing and executing as a team. The Hurricanes were also poor in the halves with the ten invisible and Cam Roigard trying to play up tempo, Helter skelter rugby which is what the Brumbies wanted.


Roigards passing was telegraphic with his running game and sniping non existent, Ratima also appears to be getting metronomic, devoid of flair and his ten went invisible as well.


If you can't step up at finals then you need to be punished, yes the blues were poor at times this season but they were right on either the last two games when it really matters.


CWL is a bit larger but both him and Lakai are down on size for an eight and aren't freaks like Savea. Sotutu has to be in the mix and Dalton, but only if they front this Friday night.


However six is an ongoing issue, Josh Beehre could be an answer to the lack of height in the loose forwards at Allblacks level, his driving try to ice the contest through a decent Chiefs pack was raw determination even with support.


As for the previous try being ruled out on the flimsiest of technicalities that highlighted everything wrong with the TMO, it wasn't ‘rabbiting’, his knees dropped one after the other and he then brought his shoulders forward to extend and score, big guys can do that, that's why Sotutu has to be in the mix.


Sititi looked short of a gallop and the Chiefs might be acting a bit too cute with their bench, the coach is saying all the right things but he's in the departure lounge and the signs are there that the Chiefs expected to be the best team in finals simply because they had the best bench.


They're now under the pump and the winner of this year's super final will almost certainly be whoever wins this Friday in Christchurch.

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