Amee-Leigh Costigan believes Ireland's confidence has only grown further, despite Saturday's 49-5 defeat to England in Cork.
The Red Roses scored 42 of those points in a devastating second half performance as they continued their march towards a seventh Guinness Women’s Six Nations title in a row.
Part of the reason Ireland felt that English wrath in the second half was because for the opening 40 minutes at Virgin Merdi Park, they had poked the bear.
England led 7-5 after what had been a hugely competitive first half, and while they did have the majority of the scoring chances, they were being snuffed out by an aggressive Irish defence.
To put that in context, England had secured a try bonus-point in each of their previous four Six Nations games, and they were 38-3 in front by half time when the sides met this time last year.
As heavy as the scoreline was at the end, the positives far outweighed the negatives from an Irish point of view.
Ireland captain and tryscorer Amee-Leigh Costigan is taking plenty of encouragement from Ireland's loss to England, who top the global rankings. pic.twitter.com/oOtxrdY6fl
— RTÉ Sport (@RTEsport) April 12, 2025
"You just have to look at it, it's so evident when you actually look at what we did in that first half plus the 10 into the second half," Amee-Leigh Costigan, scorer of Ireland’s try on Saturday, said of their growth.
"We just put our body on the line for our jersey, for the players around us. The staff give us every single tool that we need to go out there and believe in everything that we can put out there. I’m just so proud of the girls. It’s special to be part of this group."
And Costigan, who has captained Ireland for two of their three games, believes their drive to improve won't see them become complacent ahead of the upcoming trips to Wales and Scotland.
"We hold ourselves to high expectations. Our standards are higher than any standards that anyone can put on us because that’s what we want to drive.
"We want to drive huge standards so that we can perform at our very best when it's needed."
England’s 42-point second half haul showed the gulf in experience between the sides, with the visitors able to call upon seasoned veterans like Amy Cokayne and Sarah Bern, the latter of whom scored two tries. The English bench combined for 294 caps, just four shy of Ireland’s appearance total for their starting XV.
As the game wore on England could shut down Ireland’s previously impeccable set-piece, winning six scrum penalties and forcing the Irish pack down to a 66% return on lineouts.
"We almost need to understand what layer of challenge playing England is," said Bemand, who believes his side will learn from their experience.
"It was very respectful. They put out arguably what I would say is their strongest team. I think that’s England’s best team.
Scott Bemand is shifting his focus to a Women's Six Nations clash with Wales, but that first-half defensive display pleased the Ireland head coach. https://t.co/rbzqyxOtRl
— RTÉ Sport (@RTEsport) April 12, 2025
"And some of the things that we’ve done there will form big parts of foundations that we will need going into a World Cup year. You need to train it, you need to evidence it. We’ve got some evidence now that we can build some positive story in and around. The more the players start to see it, get exposed to it, feel it, the more they can believe.
"I think we’ll look back and say we absorbed a reasonable amount of pressure in terms of a good defensive display in that first half. We would have liked to have got a bit more on them, to have got a bit more movement in their legs. We can learn that, we can pick through the game and we can be positive about that.
"The few games that we’ve got, Wales and Scotland, are two games that we won last year. So the players know they can go there and be successful. But those teams are not going to make it easy for us playing away from home is always harder than playing at home but we need to do that for a World Cup."
