Japan’s World Cup odyssey continued last night with a hard-fought but well-deserved 38-19 defeat of Samoa in front of a jubilant home crowd in Toyota.

The World Cup dreams of Italy – and their talismanic captain Sergio Parisse who retires at the tournament’s end – have been shattered after a 49-3 humbling at the hands of an impressive and powerful South Africa in Shizuoka.

Ireland have got their World Cup campaign back on track with a 35-0 defeat of Russia in Kobe, going some way towards putting the horror show against hosts Japan to rest. But given they were playing the 20th ranked team in the world, and a Russian side forced to play for 20 minutes a man down after two yellow cards, this wasn’t quite the one-sided try-fest that was predicted, or indeed expected.