Ireland will look to home advantage to help secure a third consecutive third-place Women’s Six Nations finish.
Scott Bemand’s side welcome Wales to Belfast’s Affidea Stadium next Saturday (KO 6:30pm) in Round 4 of the championship.
They then round things off with a historic match against Scotland on Sunday 17 May (KO 2.30pm), as Dublin’s Aviva Stadium hosts the first-ever standalone women’s match at the home of Irish Rugby.
Having already beaten Italy in Galway in Round 2, three home wins was Ireland’s minimum target for this championship, with England and France both away games.
Capabilities
“We make no bones about it, three home wins was the goal at the start and go over and maybe put in a big performance and try to nick one away from home,” said Ireland kicking coach Gareth Steenson.
“It’s got to be where the group’s at. You’ve got to want to go and win. The capabilities are there.
“I think the way the fixtures have fallen. England first up, it was good to play that big game and get us into that competition to see where we’re at.
“Then we go to Galway and put in that performance against a good Italian team, scoring seven tries in the first half. Conditions were difficult but we adapted really well to it.
“And then to put the fight up that we did [in France], it kind of lined up that you needed two good Test matches to go into what was effectively as tough a game as those girls have experienced.”
Bounce back
Ireland will be eager to get the disappointment of their 26-7 defeat to France in Clermont out of their system, having failed to turn their first half dominance into points.
Bemand’s side were held up over the French tryline on several of occasions as well as having a try chalked off for a knock-on in the lead up.
France made them pay in the second half as they ran in three unanswered tries.
It left Ireland still waiting for their first victory on French soil, and their first win over France since 2017. A run now stretching to nine matches.
Steenson says having a weekend off after the disappointment of France was “good timing”.
“When you look back on it, there is a lot we’re getting right as a group,” said Steenson.
“We’re creating opportunities which before we probably weren’t.
“Look at the England game, we went over and didn’t fire shots. We took a bit long to get into the game.
“We went over [to France] with a plan which was implemented for the best part of the first half, we just didn’t get the scores.”
Momentum
Ireland had travelled to Clermont looking to avenge their 18-13 World Cup quarter-final defeat to France at Sandy Park.
Victory would have set them up to break the England-France dominance at the top of the Six Nations table.
That they let a golden opportunity slip is another learning experience for this developing Ireland team, says Steenson.
“When you’re away in France or any away game, you want to understand the momentum shifts within games and there was definitely after half-time a momentum shift,” he said.
“It’s about understanding how to curtail that at times and knowing that the opposition are going to have their moments in games.”
He added: “Even at half-time I felt we were in a good space. Now there were a few punched out because of the physical element that was put into the game, a lot of effort put into it.
“There’s so many big learnings to be taken and I know that’s the old classic, you hear all these things about cliches and learning, but that’s where this group is, this group is not the finished article.
“The more they keep putting themselves in these scenarios and playing in those big cauldrons, they want to be playing in those types of games.”
