Morning Chronicle - Farrell 'proud' of Ireland's grit in victory over Australia

The 49-year-old Englishman will take a sabbatical as coach of the British & Irish Lions -- "I am not going on holiday," he said when pushed on his taking time off the Irish job -- and leaves with three wins from their four November Tests.

However, all four Tests, starting with the defeat by New Zealand, have been littered with errors, an uncommon theme during his reign.

A sloppy first-half with many handling errors left Ireland trailing 13-5 to an Australia side coached by their former handler Joe Schmidt.

"We were feeling sorry for ourselves but you've no right to think that everything's going to go your own way, all singing, all dancing the whole time," said Farrell of the dressing room at half-time.

"So with that in mind, we got over ourselves and I thought we came back strong.

"The big picture of the game is that I'm really proud of the victory because it was hard fought in the end against a bit of adversity, so delighted to get the win."

Farrell shrugged aside the significance of beating a side coached by his former boss Schmidt, against whom he will pit his wits on the Lions tour of Australia next year.

"It's not about the wins, it's about us performing, progressing, making sure that we get over things in the right manner," said Farrell.

"It's not just about winning, it's about how this group's going to keep going forward."

Farrell had made a big call in selecting 21-year-old Sam Prendergast ahead of Jack Crowley at fly-half, the latter having been first choice since the retirement of Johnny Sexton after last year's Rugby World Cup.

Prendergast, in just his third Test, performed well, although Schmidt observed he was flustered on several occasions when he was isolated "which he normally is not".

- 'Probably disappointment' -

Crowley came on and added much-needed momentum to the attack and set up Ireland's decisive third try.

"I thought Sam had some lovely stuff," said Farrell. "He made some errors, some kicks that weren't perfect.

"His touch-finding kicks were outstanding and it's a real feature. He had some nice playing. Some nice innovative stuff from him.

"But equally I thought Jack was excellent when he came on. He took the game over."

Schmidt for his part was also "proud" of his side which he has guided to six wins and seven defeats in his first year in charge.

It is a considerable improvement on the disjointed and demoralised Wallabies side he took over from Eddie Jones after they failed to advance from the pool stage of the 2023 Rugby World Cup.

"I thought they demonstrated a level of grit that you need if you're going to be competitive with the Lions and competitive with Ireland, number two team in the world," said Schmidt.

"I think we made them work pretty hard tonight to get the win.

"We'd love to have got into the mix and got the 'W' ourselves."

Schmidt, who played a pivotal role in New Zealand's World Cup quarter-final victory over the Irish last year, conceded there was a bit of disappointment, too.

"We were talking about you can't beat them with a sledgehammer, you've got to get the scalpel out and you've got to be accurate," said the 59-year-old New Zealander.

"That's the best way to open them up."

Schmidt added: "We probably opened them up enough times to get scoreboard separation. When you get to 13-5 that’s a nice separation.

"If we could have scored first after half time and it’s our kick-off, kick it deep and then suddenly give up a penalty, yeah, that was disappointment."

V.Ratliff--MC-UK