MARSEILLE – Ireland coach Andy Farrell said that his team’s 38-17 thrashing of France on Feb 2 gave them invaluable momentum in their bid to retain their Six Nations rugby title.

The Irish outscored France – reduced to 14 men after lock Paul Willemse was red-carded in the 32nd minute – five tries to two in Marseille to consign the hosts to their heaviest defeat since Fabien Galthie took over as head coach in 2019.

“We’d take any type of win, on a Friday night in Marseille to kick off the Six Nations,” said Farrell, praising his team’s composure.

“The more the game went on, the more you saw the performance building. It wasn’t all singing, all dancing. But we were pretty ruthless when we needed to be.”

Looking ahead to the next match on Feb 10, the coach added: “It’s a good start. We have Italy next and getting off to a good start was always going to be a tough ask here. We’ve done that now so we need to grow off the back of it.”

In a Test between two sides whose high World Cup hopes were cruelly crushed in the quarter-finals last October, Ireland showed they clearly have recovered better.

They prevailed with tries by Jamison Gibson-Park, Tadhg Beirne, Calvin Nash, Dan Sheehan and Ronan Kelleher, and points from the boot of Jack Crowley.

France scored tries through Damian Penaud and Paul Gabrillagues, while Thomas Ramos kicked seven points in a worrying defensive display by Galthie’s side.

Ireland outplayed France for large parts of the game at the Stade Velodrome, and Farrell also highlighted what he called the “world-class” line-out performance.

“It wasn’t just the attacking line-out, it was the defensive line-out. If you have a platform like that, you can be excited about your attack off the back of it,” he said.

Lock Beirne was outstanding, as was his rookie partner Joe McCarthy, named Man of the Match.

“Our set piece went well and we won our line-out ball. We were in-sync as a team and everyone played their part. It was fantastic,” McCarthy said.

“It’s never easy to win away in France. We didn’t probably expect to get such a high score but we’re really happy.

“The atmosphere was absolutely mental, so everyone dug in and it was a fantastic team performance.”

Peter O’Mahony, who was made Ireland captain after the retirement of Johnny Sexton, hailed the win as well, saying: “I don’t think it gets any better.

“It was a serious Test match. I’m very proud of the lads with our control of the game. It was a good start and a good performance.”

For Galthie, it was back to the drawing board and he insisted that thoughts would immediately turn to their away trip to Scotland next weekend.

“We were on the backfoot very early, down to 14,” he said. “The Irish played the match, we played at 14.

“It’s a defeat in the opening Six Nations game. We conceded five tries, it’s something we’ll have to deal with, it’s tough.

“But the tournament carries on and there are four games to play. We’re away to Scotland next, so we’ll prepare for that. We keep our heads up and accept this defeat.”

France skipper Gregory Alldritt, deputising for Antoine Dupont who has opted to focus on rugby sevens ahead of this summer’s Paris Olympics, admitted that his team had “wanted to show another face”.

“It’s not the image of the French team we wanted to show,” he said. “Now we’re going to own it, keep our heads up and change it for next week.”

On Feb 3, England kicked off their campaign with a hard-fought 27-24 win over Italy in Rome, ending a longstanding opening-day hoodoo.

They managed to recover from a scruffy start and a first-half 17-8 deficit to pull through and face Wales at Twickenham next weekend. AFP, REUTERS