Review

O'Leary stars as Ireland beat Wales

Saturday, March 13 Wales' first-half woes continued as scrum-half Tomas O'Leary created two tries and scored another in Ireland's 27-12 RBS 6 Nations victory at Croke Park.

After an evenly-contested opening quarter to the match, Ireland took full advantage of Lee Byrne’s sin binning to score through Keith Earls and O’Leary to help put themselves 16-6 ahead at the break.

Wales’ aggregate halftime score in the Championship so far reads 18-67 and it could have been far worse had Jonathan Sexton not had an off day with the boot.

In their previous matches, Wales had roared back after the break but Earls’ second try – again conjured up by RBS 6 Nations man-of-the-match O’Leary – on the hour mark ended the match as a contest.

Sexton missed a glorious opportunity to open the scoring when he sent his third minute penalty wide bang in front of the posts.

And it was the fly-half’s offence at the breakdown that allowed opposite number Stephen Jones to put Wales ahead in the ninth minute.

On 16 minutes, Sexton found his range with a 35m penalty after Jonathan Thomas was pinged for going in off his feet.

In an evenly-matched first quarter of the match, both teams resembled boxers seeking out weakness in their opponent before attempting to unleash a knockout punch.

But the game was turned on its head in a ten-minute spell which started with Sexton kicking Ireland 6-3 ahead after a delightful burst by winger Tommy Bowe.

Moments later, the visitors were reduced to 14 men when Byrne was harshly sent to the bin for holding onto the ball in the tackle just outside the Irish 22 and Ireland immediately smelt blood.

Sexton found touch and when they won another penalty for Shane Williams failing to release in a tackle, scrum-half O’Leary opted to take a quick tap instead of going for the three points.

His decision paid dividends as Ireland spread the ball quickly and against an unorganised Welsh defence, Brian O’Driscoll, who was making his 100th international appearance, was able to slip Earls through for the game’s opening try.

Sexton again had a case of the yips with his conversion as he horribly shanked his kick against the post to leave Wales eight points ahead.

But the visitors’ punishment was not yet finished and O’Leary went from provider to finisher as he picked up Paul O’Connell’s offload before twisting his way past the covering Leigh Halfpenny.

Again Sexton was off target with the conversion but even by the time Byrne re-emerged from the bin the damage had been done.

Wales did though secure the last score of the half through Jones’ penalty after Jamie Roberts came within inches of the tryline to leave the halftime score 16-6.

Predictably Wales came out fired up for the second half and enjoyed a huge spell of pressure near the Irish tryline.

But after several scrums collapsed, Ireland put a shove on and cleared their lines to inflict a huge psychological blow to the visitors which was compounded by Sexton’s 50th minute penalty.

Four minutes later Jones responded with a penalty of his own but ultimately Ireland were looking comfortable in defence and with possession which they would soon capitalise on.

O’Leary again did the damage, breaking the Welsh line before feeding Earls who had enough speed and power to roll out of Shane Williams' grasp and ground the ball to make it 24-9.

Jones’ fourth penalty soon after kept Wales within touching distance and in a last throw of the dice the fly-half kicked for the corner instead of the posts with eight minutes remaining.

But when No.8 Gareth Delve was penalised for holding on Welsh hopes of rescuing a disappointing Championship were dashed and Sexton’s exquisite late drop goal merely rubbed salt in the wounds.

Scorers:

Ireland: Tries: Earls (2), O'Leary Penalties: Sexton (3) Drop Goals: Sexton

Wales: Penalties: Jones (4)

With thanks to rbs6nations.com

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