O’Sullivan Proud Of What Was Achieved.

We’re looking for a big performance tonight. We feel if we get it right tonight we could shake them up and maybe win the game. That’s what Eddie O’Sullivan said, talking to RTE’s Claire McNamara shortly after the Irish squad arrived at Melbourne’s Testra Dome.

Well O’Sullivan’s Irish side didn’t shake up the Wallabies.
They absolutely rattled the corridors of not just Australian rugby but of the world game. On this performance this Ireland side is as good as any in the world right now. They were desperately unlucky to lose this game.

The disappointment of the one point defeat was etched on the face of Ireland coach O’Sullivan who nevertheless expressed his pride in his side’s performance.

We’re a pretty devastated team at the moment. Second half I thought we played all the rugby really and deserved to win that game. A couple of key decisions went against us at the very end of the game which knocked the guts out of the side.

I’m very proud of what they achieved today. They played the world champions in their own back yard and took the game to them every yard of the way.

We felt it was a game we could win. We went in with that frame of mind. We knew that if we took the game to Australia they’d feel the pressure. And they did for a long long time. We just gave them a bad start. We couldn’t get the ball for twenty minutes and at that stage they were ahead of us. But from then on in we matched them blow for blow. And maybe I think we shaded that game. If there was any justice we’d have pulled that one off but, it wasn’t to be.

Irish captain Keith Wood was just as downbeat as his coach and intimated that he’d love another crack at the Aussies.

We’ve still a quarter final to look forward to and maybe we might get a chance to wreak revenge, before the end of this tournament. We might meet again.

We didn’t turn over as much ball as we have in previous games. I thought Australia played very well, defended very well, We still thought we could’ve had it. We were very close to having it.

We’re obviously not happy because we came here to win. But we’ve a match to win next week so we’re not going to be too het-up over it.

It’s the first time we’ve played in conditions that are in any way vaguely normal. People think we like the wind, the rain. We don’t. We’ve had horrible conditions so far. We’d be happy if it stayed like this from here on in. Pity we can’t play under a closed roof all the time.