A star is born

Sam Prendergast was named man of the match as Ireland picked up their second win in this year’s Six Nations by beating Scotland 32-18 in Murrayfield today.

The Kildare man, who has strong Carlow links through his mother Ciara, was criticised in some quarters after his display against England in the opening game and some expected him to lose his place in the starting XV to Munster’s Jack Crowley.

However, Prendergast, just three days shy of his 22nd birthday, delivered his best performance in an Ireland jersey to date as he completed 80 minutes for the first time.

He kicked 12 points as well as delivering an inch perfect pass for Calvin Nash to score the first of Ireland’s tries and afterwards, he told RTÉ he was blown away by the whole occasions.

“It was an unbelievable game, savage atmosphere. I couldn’t really believe when the national anthems were being sung, I was trying to just focus on the task at hand but it was pretty special,” he said.

Ireland started the game superbly and raced into a 17-0 lead but had to deal with strong Scottish pressure at times too.

“I thought we started unbelievably in the game, we put so much pressure on. It wasn’t perfect but we just kept piling on moments.

“I thought we did really well in the second half when they got their purple patch to then come back. I think that shows a good bit of character from us. It wasn’t perfect from us but it was better than last week and we’ll keep trying to get better week on week,” he said.

As well as his excellent kicking off the tee, Prendergast showed a wide array of passing skills but the modest youngster passed the credit on to his team-mates.

“If you look across the backline, and the platform we get from the forwards, Jamo (Jamison Gibson Park) inside me, the lads in the centre, Ringer (Garry Ringrose) came on. All the back three, it makes my job a bit easier. They are all world class players so it makes me look a bit better,” he said. 

Afterwards, RTÉ pundit Donal Lenihan felt it was significant that Prendergast’s competition for the out-half position, Crowley, came into the game at full back and Ireland finished the game with the Leinster and Munster number 10 on the pitch.

"I think we saw the emergence of an outstanding player in Sam Prendergast. We felt that this player. We felt this player had something special. This was the first time he has played away from home at international level, first time he played 80 minutes, ended up a deserved player of the match.

"I thought it was significant Simon Easterby getting both Jack Crowley and Sam on the pitch at the same time, moving Hugo Keenan to the wing. It opens up all kinds of possibilities for the future," said Lenihan.