Ireland's hard-fought win over world champions South Africa will only increase the team's belief and confidence, says Simon Easterby.
The Springboks missed 11 points off the tee but Ireland, despite losing six lineouts and conceding nine penalties and a free-kick, were five points to the good at the final whistle.
"They pitch up time and time again, over the last couple of seasons in particular," said the defence coach. They've managed to put in performances like that.
"That’s not a one-off. We’ve done it in New Zealand, we’ve done it in the autumn series last year against South Africa so that doesn’t surprise us.
"I guess the level of physicality and the brutality of the game these days, that’s something that the players have got to get their heads around and to a man they did that.
"It was relentless at times, we had a lot of defending to do and at the end, a couple of opportunities for them to have a crack at us and the lineout defence has held strong.
"Yeah, we got the reward but there’s lots we could be better at, and that’s the feeling in the changing room. Really pleased with a lot of aspects of the performance but we know we have to be better."
The Six Nations champions had appeared to fix lineout issues that cropped up in recent wins over England, Samoa and Romania, against Tonga, but something went seriously wrong in that department in Paris.
"The way South Africa defend, they're one of the best defensive teams in terms of the lineout," said second-row Tadhg Beirne, who claimed two throws and a turnover in the game.
"We knew they were going to be good. We had a plan, it just didn't go the way we wanted at the start so we stuck with the plan and then it started to come good for us.
"Sometimes you win some lineouts that you think you had a plan for and sometimes you lose them, and at the start we lost them. But we didn't fold, we stuck with the plan."
It was a pulsating contest with the sides matching each other hit for hit and mistake for mistake. Ireland racked up 23 missed tackles and were turned over 12 times. The Springboks missed 19 across the 80 minutes and lost 18 to turnovers.
"It was very tough, very physical, a proper Test match that was," tighthead Finlay Bealham said before he was asked about South Africa's replacements, who were outplayed by the Irish bench.
"Well, the old 'bomb squad’, yeah, they are a bunch of really good rugby players and physical, especially scrum and maul," said the Connacht prop, who made six tackles in his 16 minutes on the field, missing none.
"We play a lot against those boys at club, you know what they can bring, they are a tough old bunch of boys.
"We knew the challenge that was ahead of us and being in a tight-knit group we are not listening to outside noise, we are just focusing on ourselves and being the best version of ourselves.
"I didn’t focus on that too much, just focused on being the best Finlay I could."
