Ireland eventually reached their desired destination in Sunday's Guinness Six Nations game against Italy. They got the bonus point win but did not take the scenic route in getting there. It was far from Ireland's most aesthetically pleasing performance.
It was five points ground out via an underwhelming showing, one which has raised questions rather than answered them.
Speaking on Virgin Media on Sunday evening, former Ireland hooker Shane Byrne had some concerns regarding the Irish team's body language during the game.
"This is something that you saw the whole way through," said Byrne.
O'Mahony won a penalty in the 22. You used to see players coming in high fiving, 'well done', really bigging it you, that little boost you get, little energisers - it was absolutely non-existent right the way throughout the game.
You could actually see on a lot of faces, there were little quips going at each other.
Johnny Sexton, hopefully he wasn't giving out that he was coming off. Joe [Schmidt] said he was a little upset about the treatment he was getting [from Italy].
All of this adds to the atmosphere that there's disquiet throughout the team.
We all know that they are still fantastic players. Joe has that major challenge on his hands to get them psychologically ready for the game because it's only a couple of months ago that they were beating the number one team in the world.
You can watch Byrne speaking on Virgin Media One below.
The body language of the Ireland players looked off at times today.
Such a contrast to 2018. 🤔#GuinnessSixNations #VMTVRugby pic.twitter.com/XTRcgdxX2p— Virgin Media Sport (@VMSportIE) February 24, 2019
Photo by Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile
