All Blacks defeat Ireland in Dublin

This weekend sees the first anniversary of the death of the legendary Jonah Lomu and the New Zealanders have revealed that the giant winger, who helped revolutionise the game in the 1990s, has been in their thoughts in the build-up to the clash.

New Zealand were punished for showing “a lack of respect” to Ireland when they lost in Chicago and could be in for another shock in Saturday’s rematch at Dublin’s Aviva Stadium, according to former Lions wing Luke Fitzgerald.

Ireland handed Kieran Read his first loss as New Zealand captain, and that made the last two weeks uncomfortable, he said.

Sexton was off minutes later with a hamstring injury, joining crocked team mates centre Robbie Henshaw and flanker CJ Stander.

“Defensively we should be better and we need to be better”.

“But for us, when we look back at some of those scores and some of the breaks we let New Zealand get away with, there are a lot of improvements we can make”.

New Zealand include 10 of the team which started in the Chicago defeat. His pitch speaks more on Ireland’s ever-hardening mindset under exacting Kiwi head coach Joe Schmidt.

The Irish couldn’t exploit intense third-quarter pressure – despite Fekitoa’s sin-binning – with Rob Kearney’s inability to off-load as a try beckoned in the 56th minute a key moment after Israel Dagg had fumbled a Simon Zebo kick.

But, unlike in Chicago, Ireland couldn’t take advantage of their extra man and had only a penalty goal to show for their efforts in the subsequent 10 minutes. “One needs to feel that we have a chance on important calls like that”.

“You’ve got to take heart from our performance that but it’s not good enough, losing”.

“I’m not sure where you’re going with this, do you want me to tell you we’re a dirty side or something?”

“I think we’re at about six to one not that we’re allowed to indulge in that (betting)”.

“We’ll leave that to the authorities, we’ll feed our feedback through the appropriate channels”.

“Couple that with having a lot of really exciting young talent and we play against each other week in, week out, and we’ve also been to some very big places and won”.

Ireland attacked with aggression in the second half and kept New Zealand pinned within its own half for lengthy stretches, but repeatedly spilled the ball as it neared the All Blacks’ tryline.

Hansen, though, expects another tough tussle not least because he says Schmidt has added more weapons to the traditional ones the Irish brought to the table before. “I felt we deserved to get our nose in front when we did and the players managed to protect the lead but at the same time, I don’t think they are going to afford us any headstarts this weekend”.

The performance drew admirative tweets from such diverse characters as author JK Rowling and U.S. vice-president Joe Biden as defeat stopped the All Blacks’ world record Test run of 18 successive wins in its tracks.

“To kick like a forward pass to the wingers changed their defensive shape a wee bit”.