Greg McWilliams believes there is much more to come from Ireland after they were handed their second defeat of the 2022 TikTok Women’s Six Nations by France.
Les Bleues ran in six tries in Toulouse as Mélissande Llorens, Laure Sansus, Audrey Forlani and Clara Joyeux all crossed before half-time to put the hosts 26-0 up.
Sansus got her second shortly after the break before Emilie Boulard completed the scoring as France prevailed 40-5, with Eve Higgins going over for the sole Ireland try.
And while McWilliams admitted his side’s set-piece was not quite up to scratch, he felt positive that Ireland are moving in the right direction and stressed that patience will be required.
“Let’s be honest, if you’ve watched the game, we’ve got a lot of work to do around our set-piece. The coaches know that, the players know that and we’ve got to own that,” he said.
“We’ve got to aim for it to be better but in a weird twist of fate, I don’t feel too bad after this game even though it was a defeat we wouldn’t want to have.
“I think the girls grew in confidence and they realised, ‘you know, what we can do this’ because momentum is a strange thing, when you have positive momentum it’s terrific.
“When you have negative momentum, it’s hard to get it back and we had that in the first half. It was one of those halves where you wanted to get into the changing room.
“You want to be able to get the laptops out and fix a few things which I thought we did in the second half but there’s more to come from this Irish side.
“And I just hope that people out there stay patient because you have to be very proud of the girls and their efforts and that’s all I can ask for as a coach.
“That’s what inspiration is, the ability to keep working and not drop the head and I’m just so impressed with them for that effort. These are a really good group of players.”
The defeat was Ireland’s second of the 2022 Championship, having also surrendered a 19-10 lead to lose 27-19 to Wales in Dublin last weekend, with Italy up next in Round 3.
But having been buoyed by the way his team responded after a tough first half at the Stade Ernest-Wallon, McWilliams feels that with a few tweaks Ireland are not too far away.
“You want to hold on to the ball in international rugby, particularly when your set-piece isn’t functioning,” said McWilliams, who took over as Ireland head coach in December 2021.
“At times when we were trying to build momentum, we were making basic handling errors and it was tough because we lost all the momentum and suddenly it goes 3-0, 8-0, 13, 15.
“All of a sudden, it’s 26-0 but in the second half I felt the girls reacted well at half-time. We watched a bit of video in the changing room and we tweaked a few things.
“I thought their depth was better, their execution was better, and looking at the defensive line that’s just something you have to be proud of as they were making an impact.
“We had a really good line against a French team that, let’s not forget, beat New Zealand comfortably in November twice but it is disappointing, you have to hold on to the ball.
“I thought with ball in hand we looked dangerous, we varied our attack. Rugby is a game of possession and you want to get hold of the ball and hold it for long periods.
“We didn’t and I’m disappointed with that but again, if you look at the Welsh game and the areas we had to work on after Wales, we saw huge improvements on that.
“It’s not a fake pat on the back, it’s about showing as a group that we’re working so hard to get better and we saw elements of that today.
“That’s why I’m in a relatively okay state of mind after a defeat. I’m looking forward to next week. We’ve got more work to do and we’ll look at the video and try and put our best foot forward.”
