The first half was surprisingly full of errors by both teams. Carter missed some regulation penalties at goal, O'Gara was wayward kicking out of hand and the Irish line-out was poor. Worryingly for next week against Wales, the All Blacks set piece was strong. Ali Williams was bossing the game at line-out. Ireland were still very much in the game come the stroke of half time. New Zealand went through a few phases and found themselves in Ireland's 22. They had stretched the Irish defence and Nonu chipped to the corner for McCaw to score a try. Tommy Bowe raced across and stuck out a hand to knock the ball in touch. After a TMO decision the referee awarded a penalty try for deliberately knocking the ball out and handed Bowe a yellow card. Very disappointing, I was looking forward to see Bowe in attack. I guess he's not quite the complete player yet.
Tony Woodcock picked up a yellow card in the first two minutes of the second half and this seemed to spur New Zealand on. They scored two tries with 14 men in the next ten minutes. The game was more or less over and Ireland were playing for pride. The men in green never really got going and when talismanic forward O'Connell left the field there was no way back.
My man of the match: Ali Williams
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