France Show Their Class To Scupper Ireland U-20s’ World Title Bid

Ireland’s World Rugby Under-20 Championship odyssey ended in bitter disappointment as France punished their errors to record a convincing 50-14 final win in Cape Town.

2023 WORLD RUGBY UNDER-20 CHAMPIONSHIP FINAL:

Friday, July 14 –

IRELAND UNDER-20s 14 FRANCE UNDER-20s 50, Athlone Sports Stadium, Cape Town
Scorers: Ireland: Tries: Fintan Gunne, John Devine; Cons: Sam Prendergast 2
France: Tries: Mathis Ferté 2, Lino Julien, Pierre Jouvin, Nicolas Depoortere, Lenni Nouchi, Léo Drouet; Cons: Hugo Reus 6; Pen: Hugo Reus
HT: Ireland 14 France 17

Les Bleuets won their third successive World U-20 title with a ruthless attacking performance, scoring five of their seven tries in the second half after trailing 14-10 on the 30-minute mark.

Hoping to add global success to their back-to-back U-20 Six Nations Grand Slams, the Ireland U-20s (sponsored by PwC) had hit the front in the fourth minute through Fintan Gunne’s smartly-taken try from a tap penalty.

John Devine crashed over for a second converted score, replying to a Mathis Ferté effort, but Lino Julien edged the French back in front and some late pressure saw Paddy McCarthy sin-binned for pulling down a maul.

Richie Murphy’s youngsters fought hard to be only 17-14 behind at half-time, yet the loss of the influential loosehead was keenly fought on the restart. Pierre Jouvin and Nicolas Depoortere ran in a quick-fire double.

Suddenly, captain Gus McCarthy and his team-mates had a 17-point deficit to overcome. They had their moments, building some promising phases but a shaky lineout let them down as well as some costly penalties and turnovers.

The short turnaround in games appeared to catch up with them too, while France remained full of running. A 12-minute flurry saw the pre-match favourites pick up three more tries, with Ferté, skipper Lenni Nouchi and Léo Drouet adding a late gloss.

Driven on by number 8 Marko Gazzotti, both the Mastercard player-of-the-match and player-of-the-tournament, Sébastien Calvet’s charges were undoubtedly the best team on the night. Their consistency and counter-attacking magic was unmatched across the five match days.

While the defeat was tough to take, Murphy’s young guns can carry their heads high after producing Ireland’s best ever season at the U-20 grade. It is all the more impressive given the tragic circumstances they have had to deal with.

With World Championship silver medals to add to their second successive Grand Slam, Murphy commented afterwards: “I told you last week that we were proud of them before we ever came to Cape Town, and they’ve built on that.

“Over the course of the year, going back to October, they came in as boys and they’ll leave here as very mature young men who have had an incredible experience together as a group.

“But also from a rugby point of view where they’ve been stretched on a regular basis and just keep coming back with answers. I’m extremely proud of Gus and the rest of the guys, they’ve been incredible to work with.”

Reacting to the match itself and how it panned out, the Wicklow man admitted; “(We were) outplayed, yeah. In fairness the French are very good, we knew that going in. We knew that we would have to be very accurate in order to get ourselves in the game.

“We started pretty well. Still, couple of big moments in game where we were very much in it, a couple of things went against us.

“The (Jouvin) try on 41 minutes is a killer. If you go back and have look at it, you’ll see that someone joined maul from in front of the ball carrier, which should be a penalty to us.

“It should be an opportunity to get out of our end, but those moments in the game cause extra stress in your team. We weren’t accurate enough ourselves though.

“Our lineout didn’t function as well as it has done in the rest of the Championship which was a bit of a disappointment, but there are so many reasons for that. The French are a very good team, they put on a lot pressure in that area and they got the better of us there.

“It’s disappointing to get into a final, you only ever want to win. We go home with a silver medal, which we are extremely proud about, but today is about the final.

“France are deserved winners, they played really good rugby and we weren’t quite at the level.”

TIME LINE: 4 minutes – Ireland try: Fintan Gunne – 5-0; conversion: Sam Prendergast – 7-0; 14 mins – France try: Mathis Ferté – 7-5; conversion: Hugo Reus – 7-7; 22 mins – France penalty: Hugo Reus – 7-10; 31 mins – Ireland try: John Devine – 12-10; conversion: Sam Prendergast – 14-10; 35 mins – France try: Lino Julien – 14-15; conversion: Hugo Reus – 14-17; 39 mins – Ireland yellow card: Paddy McCarthy; Half-time – Ireland 14 France 17; 42 mins – France try: Pierre Jouvin – 14-22; conversion: Hugo Reus – 14-24; 45 mins – France try: Nicolas Depoortere – 14-29; conversion: Hugo Reus – 14-31; 64 mins – France penalty: missed by Hugo Reus – 14-31; 69 mins – France try: Mathis Ferté – 14-36; conversion: missed by Hugo Reus – 14-36; 75 mins – France try: Lenni Nouchi – 14-41; conversion: Hugo Reus – 14-43; 79 mins – France try: Léo Drouet – 14-48; conversion: Hugo Reus – 14-50; Full-time – Ireland 14 France 50

IRELAND U-20: Henry McErlean (Terenure College RFC/Leinster); Andrew Osborne (Naas RFC/Leinster), Hugh Gavin (Galwegians RFC/Connacht), John Devine (Galway Corinthians RFC/Connacht), James Nicholson (UCD RFC/Leinster); Sam Prendergast (Lansdowne FC/Leinster), Fintan Gunne (Terenure College RFC/Leinster); Paddy McCarthy (Dublin University FC/Leinster), Gus McCarthy (UCD RFC/Leinster) (capt), Ronan Foxe (Old Belvedere RFC/Leinster), Diarmuid Mangan (UCD RFC/Leinster), Conor O’Tighearnaigh (UCD RFC/Leinster), James McNabney (Ballymena RFC/Ulster), Ruadhan Quinn (Old Crescent RFC/Munster), Brian Gleeson (Garryowen FC/Munster).

Replacements used: Evan O’Connell (UL Bohemian RFC/Munster) for Mangan, Sam Berman (Dublin University FC/Leinster) for Gavin (both 48 mins), Charlie Irvine (Queen’s University Belfast RFC/Ulster) for O’Tighearnaigh (51), Fiachna Barrett (Galway Corinthians RFC/Connacht) for Foxe (57), Matthew Lynch (Dublin University FC/Leinster) for Osborne, George Hadden (Clontarf FC/Leinster) for P McCarthy (both 66), Oscar Cawley (Naas RFC/Leinster)) for Gunne, Max Clein (Garryowen FC/Munster) for Gleeson (both 71).

FRANCE U-20: Mathis Ferté (CA Brive Corrèze); Léo Drouet (Provence Rugby), Nicolas Depoortere (Union Bordeaux-Bègles), Paul Costes (Stade Toulousain), Théo Attissogbe (Section Paloise); Hugo Reus (Stade Rochelais), Baptiste Jauneau (ASM Clermont Auvergne); Lino Julien (Racing 92), Pierre Jouvin (SU Agen), Zaccharie Affane (Union Bordeaux-Bègles), Hugo Auradou (Section Paloise), Posolo Tuilagi (USA Perpignan), Lenni Nouchi (Montpellier HR) (capt), Oscar Jegou (Stade Rochelais), Marko Gazzotti (FC Grenoble Rugby).

Replacements used: Alexandre Kaddouri (Stade Rochelais) for Julien, Brent Liufau (Section Paloise) for Tuilagi (both 56 mins), Thomas Lacombre (Stade Toulousain) for Jouvin, Thomas Duchene (ASM Clermont Auvergne) for Affane (both 71), Arthur Mathiron (Lyon OU) for Costes (73), Mathis Castro Ferreira (Stade Toulousain) for Gazotti, Clément Mondinat (Section Paloise) for Ferté (both 75), Leo Carbonneau (CA Brive Corrèze) for Jauneau (76).

Referee: Damián Schneider (Argentina)