Okay, the second half tailed off a little bit, but I think I would be far happier that they came out and steamrolled Scotland early on rather than stumble their way through the first half and then tag on some late scores.

scores.Yeah.

I think that's always the fear, as you said, like, for such a big occasion, the fear is always that it gets a little bit too much or you get a little bit distracted by the sideshow of what's going on, of the promos and the, the pressers that are involved, and having to go out and kind of almost sell the tickets for it, and trying to get as big a crowd and set the records, and it becomes about the statistics more than the game on the pitch.

And I think the girls have ... would have been acutely aware of that the whole week, and they would have known that they have talked this up, that three home wins is the b- the least that, you know, that they were hoping for out of this campaign.

And, and I think from, even from seeing them come out for warmups or even I think your most telling thing is when they're walking out the tunnel and coming out for anthems, you get a real feel for how people are feeling and how nervous people are, how emotional people are, and how it's gonna affect them.

And they just look to be absolutely right at home in that setting.

And I think we talked about it in the last few weeks on here, that the likes of the Twickenham occasion, the likes of the under the lights in France, those are occasions, and we've talked about them, that getting up for an occasion can be difficult and, and being used to that occasion.

I hope she's enjoying them now.

It's not just people deciding from day one, "I'm gonna go out and be part of an occasion."

Yeah, and I think that's what makes it even more special.

It's not just kinda everybody getting their friends and, as you said, friends and relatives and everybody you know to try buy tickets for the sake of a token kind of ticket, and it be part of something that's kinda tokenism for it.

But as you said, the traction that has developed from the build-up to the competition, from it being now in that standalone window of a women's Six Nations, coming off the back of watching the men, people can roll into watching the women's team in their standalone window.

The girls have put in the performances worthy of developing these crowds and, you know, put in a performance against England that they were frustrated with, come out the next time against Italy, blow it away in Galway, build on into France.

And we've seen it kinda grow and grow and grow in terms of what they're putting out there on the pitch.

And just that exposure, we've talked about it before, the exposure you get of players and how much you get given by the players themselves and how much they're willing to kinda open themselves up and show their personalities and their own side of things within the game.

Which of those do you wanna take first?

There's going to be a bit of a target on the Irish backs over these next couple of weeks.

100%, and it's probably the two fixtures, the Welsh and the Scottish two fixtures of over the years you'd probably feel, now English aside, but you'd probably feel the most spice in those fixtures and the physicality and the grudge that's there because over the years we have been such tit for tat and kinda seen on that same footing.

But as you've said, like yeah, we've put a number on Wales over the last couple of years, so they are not gonna wanna be coming over here and adding another loss.

I think they're, what did we say, eight losses on the bounce in the Six Nations, you know? But their, their performances week on week, you know, their most recent ones against England, yes, they went down with a 62-24 defeat, but they're taking a hell of a lot of solace from the fact that their attacking game looked decent, and they got 24 points, and including the losing bonus, try scoring bonus point against the, the best in the world.

So they will be clutching onto that and hoping to put their stamp on it.

We've seen them against France hang in there like we did, you know, put in a good 40 minutes against them, so they're not gonna come over and just roll over.

As you said, like, they're gonna have a point to prove.

That's the probably the biggest area of the game where Ireland can be got at, at the moment, isn't it?

You're not gonna break into the top four with that kind of a return from those 40 minutes.

No, and as you said, like, they had done everything else right.

They knew, and we knew, that Ireland were gonna try come out the block start fast because of, as you said, the stats speak for themselves about a slow French starting team.

They needed to come out and absolutely rattle them.

That they did.

They took it to them in every aspect.

And you said Aoife Way for setting the tone from that first carry.

Mm

It w- there was just so much pace to it.

That was the thing, yeah.

As you said, like, last week obviously you're playing against a different animal with England, and their ability to literally shut you down at the gain line, and Ireland struggled with that.

You'd still see that we said they tried to try a few moves that were a bit predictable and a bit slow and stuttery, and I think the ruck ball wasn't as quick from both the f- the players on the ground's point of view and from the nine, Emily Lane, last week.

But it wouldn't have been what she wanted as well to really show- showcase her, her best, her best skills.

I think we saw night and day of what we saw up in Galway on Saturday.

It was f- you know, one second, two second ruck ball, that gold ruck speed that you, you know, you crave in international matches.

Completely.