Six Nations: Farrell’s Ireland must ‘stop rot’ after Paris humbling

Farrell’s roll of the dice on his selection – losing out on James Lowe and giving a rare start to Cian Prendergast – was met with plenty of interesting subplots as the game approached.

But the nature of the Paris show was such that few such themes could be fairly examined.

Ireland had selected a team to compete in the air but were rarely challenged in that regard with a new-look trio of Jamie Osborne, Tommy O’Brien and Jacob Stockdale.

While the loss of both regular starting linemen to injury and the loss of two substitutes from the loosehead side was undesirable, it did give others the opportunity to step up and show what they could do, but the set-piece was rendered a virtual non-factor.

Indeed, Ireland won a scrimmage penalty in the 45th minute, but due to a lack of pressure elsewhere, Les Bleus took the whistle for the first time from Karl Dickson.

Discipline was a key area for improvement after the autumn, but with Ireland conceding just six penalties they often failed to get close enough to breach, with 38 missed tackles on the night.

Ireland’s failure to address non-negotiables (what Farrell calls “the core part of the game”) did little to sift through much else.

“I think you’re going to make your own luck in this game,” Farrell said.

“Without the ball, I thought we lost the battle in the first half. Things like winning passes high and down the field, passing tackles or missed tackles etc are the main part of the game.

“We were definitely second best in that respect in the first half. Our response was very brave, but that’s not what we want, we don’t want to be a team that answers. We had to show that from the start.”