Irish attacking efficiency was a rare sight as Andy Farrell's men suffered a third successive defeat to the All Blacks in Chicago.
In truth, New Zealand paved the way for victory with their high return on 22m entries in the opposition half.
On the hour mark, the All Blacks seemed to go up a gear, before Wallace Sititi gave them a two-score lead that the men in green never recovered from.
Up to that point, both teams struggled to impose themselves consistently in the opposition half. Ireland scored just 13 points from five 22m entries, converting only one of those visits into a try.
It had started so well when Tadhg Furlong powered his way over the line. That stemmed from a positive move down the short side of the ruck, where Jack Crowley got his hands free to get in behind the All Blacks defence, engineering a penalty when the New Zealand tackler failed to roll away.
The combative Stuart McCloskey provided the platform, with Jack Conan leading the physical charge. When the Ulster centre had a second carry, it paved the way for Furlong to crash over, displaying the type of efficiency that we had become used to with Ireland.
However, for the rest of the game, they fell back to the disorganised play that plagued their 2025 Six Nations campaign. Ireland's return was well below that of France and England in that tournament. After the 17th-minute try last weekend, Ireland failed to rattle New Zealand's cage when they entered the scoring zone in the opposition half.
Ireland didn’t score again until a 51st minute penalty. In the intervening period, the team had two entries inside the 22. One involved a Crowley kick through that was easily swept up by Will Jordan and another was a launch play off a breakout maul that Ardie Savea dismantled with a turnover in the ruck.
Ireland turned over a number of attacking opportunities in the second half within three phases. That’s not the type of play that will build scoreboard pressure, or force a referee into rewarding the attack. Ireland didn’t have the ball for long enough to force a decision from the referee.
New Zealand weren’t overly efficient either until their spark in the 60th minute with just their third 22m entry. From there, the pressure was simply ramped up.
Quinn Tupaea won yet another jackal penalty leading to Tamaiti Williams’ try from a tap penalty.
Ireland soaked tackles later in the game, and when Garry Ringrose missed his shot on Beauden Barrett - compounded by James Lowe’s failure to cut out Damien McKenzie - Sititi was there to seal the game.
Ireland’s failure to reach a two-score lead proved costly, but more worrying for Farrell was his team’s inability to get into the New Zealand 22. The strategy of wearing out the defence by dominating possession was not in evidence at Soldier Field.
There were other contributing factors to the loss. The lineout failed them at crucial times. Uncharacteristic errors from the world-class Dan Sheehan were interspersed among team errors. The loss of Tadhg Beirne didn’t help their cause.
Handling errors early in the attacking opportunities killed any momentum that Ireland had from the first half. They never looked like fighting back.
Ireland’s defence has became softer too. Soak tackles allowed for easy access and turned into discipline issues when the game was in the balance.
A 13-point return from team attack is pretty poor. Most attacking coaches have been there at some point. The soul searching is inevitable.
This will be a tough review for Farrell and his coaching team as they regroup for Japan at the weekend.
Team selection will be important to get momentum and confidence back into the team before facing Australia and South Africa.
Will Farrell give younger faces a run out in what might be the only opportunity in this international window?
It’s not time for an emotional crisis, but fresh selections might brush off the disappointing taste of defeat and help Ireland to look forward to some big challenges ahead.
Watch Ireland v Japan in the Quilter Nations Series on Saturday from 12pm on RTÉ2 and the RTÉ Player. Follow a live blog on the RTÉ News App and on rte.ie/sport. Listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1 Extra
