Wales vs Ireland - live match report

Wales take the lead 3 - 0. 

If Wayne Pivac has a bad tournament, he is toast 

Match was always going be an uphill battle for Ireland once O'Mahony stupidly got himself sent off. Despite the loss I'm a lot more optimistic for Ireland than for Wales going by that performance, Wales struggled to put Ireland away a player advantage for 65 minutes, really says it all about where they are at as a team at the moment. There is nothing I saw from Wales that makes me think they have a chance of winning the tournament.

Still an exciting first weekend that makes for an interesting championship. Advantage France and Scotland but you can't rule out England or Ireland just yet.

Stav

I normally switch off the TV when a player is red-carded  in a match as the competitive ness is normally gone.    The same thing happened in this case.  

Normally you be right, a red card that early is almost insurmountable handicap for a team to overcome, but I do recall Ireland beating South Africa a few years ago after Stander got an early enough red card and Ireland came close enough to beating Wales on Sunday. As I said I think its more a reflection of where Wales are at right now than Ireland.

Ireland were within a penalty kick in play and a good maul of winning this.....despite being down a man for almost the entire match.

Ireland actually did brilliantly during the first half. Then for some inexplicable reason Sexton and Murray got box kickitis...after they got behind they started running at the Wallies again, with their centres carving through the midfield. 

Wales look clueless.