Bright Start Not Enough For Ireland Men’s U20s As They Lose To New Zealand

A bright start that yielded two early tries and a 12-0 lead wasn’t enough for the Ireland Men’s U20s as they suffered a heavy defeat by the New Zealand U20s in their final Pool game at the World Rugby Junior World Championship in Calvisano.

Oisin Minogue (3′), who worked tirelessly, scored with just 3 minutes on the clock and had a hand in creating Ireland’s second just four minutes later as Daniel Green (7′) touched down. Tom Woods added a penalty to his conversion of the opening score on 20 minutes but New Zealand were relentless as they found their feet and overhauled Ireland with tries from Mosese Bason (11′), Xavier Treacy (21′), Cooper Roberts (26′), Will Cole (30′), and Dylan Pledger (33′) to lead 31-15 at half time.

Both sides struggled with their discipline and exchanged yellow cards with Jayden Sa and Will Wooton sent to the sin bin but the Junior All Blacks continued their powerful play in the second half denying Ireland any possession and adding further scores from Pledger (43′), Frank Vaenuku (41′), Shaun Kempton (48′) and Maloni Kunawave (67′).

Ireland finally got their hands on the ball late in the game and put together a series of pick and go drives to the line with Billy Bohan (75′) getting over for Ireland’s third try. Sam Wisniewski (75′) added the conversion. Bohan was red carded just two minutes later for an illegal clear out.

New Zealand took full advantage of the extra man for Kempton (78′) to score followed by another from Kunawave (80′) from the kick off.

The match ended 69-22. New Zealand will advance to the semi-finals while Ireland face into the playoffs.