‘We’ll Grow From This And Move Forward’ – Temple-Jones

Ireland Women’s Sevens head coach Allan Temple-Jones says his squad will ‘take a lot of learnings’ from playing knockout rugby against one of the Olympic gold medal favourites at a heaving Stade de France.

Ireland were unable to repeat their impressive Pool B performance when they took the game to Australia. Instead, the recent HSBC SVNS Grand Final winners – boosted by Maddison Levi’s hat-trick – advanced on the back of a comprehensive 40-7 victory.

With his first half scoring blitz, Levi became the all-time leading try and points scorer in Olympic history with 11 tries and 55 points so far in Paris. This surpasses the 10 tries and 50 points scored by New Zealand’s Portia Woodman-Wickliffe at Rio 2016.

With captain Lucy Mulhall Rock already sidelined, Béibhinn Parsons’ injury-enforced departure after the break added to the Irish disappointment on a night when the three European contenders all bowed out at the quarter-final stage.

Temple-Jones’ charges will return to the Saint-Denis venue this afternoon to play hosts France in a 5th place semi-final (kick-off 2pm Irish time), with China and Great Britain the other teams left battling it out in the middle bracket.

“It was a tough game for us, a tough evening for us,” he told RTÉ Sport afterwards. “We couldn’t control the game, like we did earlier on (in the day), and unfortunately we gave too many penalties away.

“When you have athletes like that running at you with the ball, you know you’re in trouble. So. Australia played well and we couldn’t control the game.

“We needed to be a bit more clinical around that breakdown area, so yeah, disappointing for us, but credit to them. They played well and they took their opportunities. Hats off.”

Eight members of the Australia squad played at the Tokyo Games, where they suffered quarter-final disappointment and finished fifth. It is a third Olympics for their captain Charlotte Caslick and Sharni Smale who both got to experience gold medal joy at Rio 2016.

In comparison, this was Ireland’s Olympic debut, with four of the group only winning their first caps in the last three years. Portarlington’s Alanna Fitzpatrick is the youngest squad member at 19, and there are four others aged between 20 and 22.

Having savoured their own HSBC SVNS Series title success in Perth in January, coming back stronger for Los Angeles 2028 will no doubt be a big motivating factor when next season – and a fresh new Olympic cycle – rolls around.

For now, finishing as high as possible in the French capital is their sole aim, and no matter today’s results, the tournament has been a crucial learning curve for the Ireland Sevens programme when you look at the semi-final line-up.

The USA have reached the last-four of an Olympics for the first time, having finished fifth in Rio and sixth in Tokyo, and the Jack Hanratty-coached Canada team, who ended the medal hopes of France in dramatic fashion last night, were ninth in 2021.

It can be a bumpy road, with its fair share of heartache, on the way to challenging for an Olympic medal. Australia have painful memories of their Tokyo quarter-final loss to Fiji, while New Zealand have been the most consistent of the lot, winning silver in Rio before striking gold at the last Games.

From an Irish perspective, Parsons and Eve Higgins both played in front of almost 50,000 spectators at Twickenham during this year’s Guinness Women’s Six Nations. The first day of this Olympic Sevens tournament set a new Women’s rugby attendance record of 66,000.

Getting to test themselves at Olympic level in front of such big crowds has really added to the experience for this Irish squad, and Temple-Jones is confident it will stand to them individually, and benefit both the Sevens and 15s programmes in the coming seasons.

“We’ve just got to learn. Playing in front of so many people at the Stade de France is unbelievable for us. First time in the Olympics, first time for a lot of these young girls to get a go.

“We’re going to take lots of learnings from it moving forward. We’ve got to grow the squad and grow the depth of our group.

“Exposing young girls to an Olympics like this and a stadium like this is going to be strength for both the 15s and Sevens squads, it’s brilliant.

“To get girls playing on this stage and mixing between both squads on the 15s and Sevens side is unbelievable.

“We hope the youngsters grow from this and move forward and be back in Los Angeles in four years’ time,” he added.

Stepping up in the absence of Mulhall Rock, Higgins has led by example with three tries and 21 points so far. Amee-Leigh Murphy Crowe, the stand-in captain, has also touched down three times, with Stacey Flood scoring 16 points, including two tries, in her four appearances.

Athy youngster Larn, who only turned 20 in mid-July, came on to make her Olympic bow as a second half replacement against Australia. She went from travelling reserve to full squad member following Mulhall Rock’s unfortunate knee injury.

13 players have got game-time for Ireland, with Parsons, Flood, Erin King, Emily Lane, Megan Burns, and Murphy Crowe starting each game between the pool stages and last night’s quarter-final.