Ireland vs South Africa was arguably the most hyped match of this November and the first half lived up to it.
Both teams came out of the blocks firing, playing with the intensity of their famous pool stage game from the 2023 World Cup.
The Springboks were first to draw blood as fullback Damian Willemse executed an acrobatic finish after just a few minutes to open the scoring.
Ireland’s Caelan Doris, South Africa’s Siya Kolisi and Referee Matthew Carley. Pic: Dan Sheridan/Inpho
However, despite the great rugby on display from both sides, the first half was debatably marred by the decision from referee Matthew Carley to not card Springboks fly-half Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu.
The young 10 appeared to have made a no-arms hit on Irish winger Tommy O’Brien that made contact very close to his head, if not his head.
After all the talk of the last two red cards the Springboks have received in recent matches against France and Italy, a lot of pressure was put on Carley and his team to make a decision and it’s fair to say not many people agreed with Carley when he decided not to card Feinberg-Mngomezulu.
Referee Matthew Carley gives Ireland’s James Ryan after TMO review
Pic: Gary Carr/INPHO
‘Ironically that was a worse tackle than either of the two that got red carded in the last couple weeks lol’, one fan posted to X. ‘Good work SA for putting so much pressure on referees. That way you avoid penalties for awful actions like that.’ said another one who didn’t agree with the call.
Then just under 15 minutes later, Ireland thought they had levelled things up after Tadhg Beirne smashed over for a try. However, on review James Ryan’s clear out on Springboks hooker Malcolm Marx was deemed to have been a high level of danger as he didn’t wrap and made clear contact to Marx’s head.
He was given a yellow card and upon bunker review it was upgraded to a 20-minute red card, which as expected enraged the Irish fans even more. Cobus Reinach and Dan Sheehan traded tries each as both Sam Prendergast and Jack Crowley received yellow cards within minutes of each other as Ireland before the Springboks were rewarded a penalty try to make it 19-7 to them after their scrum dominance saw Andrew Porter also sin binned, meaning Ireland started the second half with 12 men.
We all knew tensions were going to be high, but that first half was pulsating.
