Six Nations: Was Ireland's defeat in Paris a moral victory or a missed opportunity?

As soon as the final whistle sounded in the Stade de France, Ireland fans began the debate on where to place the defeat.

A moral victory or a badly missed opportunity?

As is often the case in the cut-throat world of online discourse, taking a position somewhere in between the two camps appears to be unanimously frowned upon.

Which is a bit of a shame, given that somewhere in the middle of those two schools of thought is surely the best place to frame Ireland's loss in Paris.

A victory, moral or otherwise, it was not. Ireland arrived in the French capital with far more than a puncher's chance of beating Fabien Galthie's red-hot side and ultimately came up short.

In the last 12 months Andy Farrell's team have improved too much to sell themselves as the plucky underdogs in any contest. This was built-up as a meeting between the northern hemisphere's two in-form sides, with the bookies favouring France by five points down largely to their home advantage. They weren't far off in the end.

Ireland do deserve immense credit for dragging themselves back into a position to win the game having looked at one stage, when Melvyn Jaminet kicked France into a 15-point lead early in the second half, like they were on the brink of falling to a heavy and far more damaging defeat.

This is largely where they can take great heart from the game: the defeat will annoy, perhaps even upset, Ireland — but it's unlikely to leave any mental scars..

In the first half they were simply outplayed by an extremely good side, and warning signs began to flash given France's dominance at the ruck where Ireland themselves had enjoyed such control a week previous.

But they found a way to fight back. What looked like a one-sided battleground in the first half resembled