Ireland have succumbed to a humbling home defeat after the All Blacks cruised to an ultimately comfortable, ten-point, 23-13 win in front of a sold-out Aviva Stadium.
Ireland came racing out of the blocks early on, opening their account with a Jack Crowley penalty. However, the short-lived lead was quickly ended by Damian McKenzie who levelled off the affair five minutes later. McKenzie would add six more for Crowley's three, to give the Kiwis a three-point lead heading in at the break.
Despite the fine margins at the break, it was a humbling second half for Farrell's men on an evening where McKenzie's boot would become the murder weapon for Ireland's three-year home unbeaten record.
While both sides traded a try a piece in the second half, Ireland's ill-discipline allowed McKenzie to send penalty after penalty through the uprights, gifting New Zealand nine second-half points, bringing his total tally to 18.
Bereft of ideas, an Ireland attack who struggled to string a consistent run of phases together simply had no answers to the questions that Scott 'Razor' Robertson had asked of them.
8 November 2024; Damian McKenzie of New Zealand kicks a penalty during the Autumn Nations Series match between Ireland and New Zealand at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin. Photo by Seb Daly/Sportsfile
Andy Farrell delivers sobering analysis of Ireland v New Zealand
On a sobering night for Irish Rugby, head coach Andy Farrell delivered a typically honest about what went wrong in Friday night's game.
Speaking to Virgin Media Sports after the game, Farrell admitted just how costly his side's ill-discipline proved, claiming his players got desperate.
We all didn't do (ourselves justice), we're all in it together.
We had too many back-to-back errors and that's not right, its not the feeling that should happen anyway.
(Those errors come from) people trying to fix things on their own, it's a little bit too depserate sometimes. Instead of just being calm enough and understanding how we get the ball back properly in the way that we want the ball so that we can get the right field position.
While Damian McKenzie's eighteen points were clear proof of the costly nature of Ireland's ill-discipline, Farrell did feel that some of the calls were deserving of a bit more debate.
Yeah, I mean we'll look at some and I'm sure we'll debate a few with the officials etc. but it is what it is, again there's no complaints from us, the best team won.
Regardless of any debate in that area, Ireland will have just seven days to improve their discipline before they take on Argentina in the Aviva Stadium.
The two sides clash at the same time next Friday the 15th of November.
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