'It's something we need to get to the bottom of' - Farrell to root out cause of sloppy performance

Andy Farrell says he isn't worried by the sloppy nature of Saturday's 35-17 win against Fiji, but says his side need to be wary of "false dawns" in the future.

Saturday's performance was several gears below the win against the world champions, and while Ireland never looked like losing against Vern Cotter's side, they made heavy work of putting the game to bed, having spent 25 minutes playing against 14 men, and a further 10 minutes with a two-man advantage, after Fiji picked up both a red and yellow card in the second half.

Continuity of performance was always likely to be a challenge for Ireland on Saturday, with Farrell having made nine changes from the win against South Africa, while Robbie Henshaw also departed in the opening minutes due to a hamstring injury.

But with Farrell having stressed the need for his wider squad to step up to the mark in recent weeks, he didn't hide his frustration in the immediate aftermath of the game.

And he says it's vital those stepping into the team bring the same levels of leadership.

"I'm not worried, there’s a lot of big characters that weren’t in the changing room.

"I’m big on how you make people feel, or how certain people make people feel. We had different leadership going on this week in all sorts of areas. It's something we need to get to the bottom of and keep progressing with.

"Sometimes you get a performance and it leads you into a false dawn. It’s good, especially off the back of a win, to really get into the bones of it and have a good dig down deep and see what the reality is."

The obvious, and concerning, coincidence was the drop-off in performance without Johnny Sexton, who suffered a dead leg in the win versus South Africa.

His replacement, Joey Carbery, had been performing