Ireland regained the Six Nations title with a 17-13 victory over Scotland at Lansdowne Road.
Tries from Dan Sheehan and Andrew Porter propelled the Irish over the line as the hosts were repeatedly prevented by a brilliant Scottish defence.
The trophy, which follows Joe Schmidt’s Ireland side of 2014/15 by winning two in a straight, is little consolation for missing out on historic Six Nations Grand Slams after losing to England last weekend. Peter O’Mahony has still to decide whether he will stay captain, and the 34-year-old veteran was near tears during the national anthems, receiving a compassionate pat on the head from Munster teammate Tadhg Beirne.
The Scots opened the scoring in the eighth minute, with Finn Russell converting a penalty to increase his tally to a half-century of points this season after James Lowe was penalised.
However, the Scots gave up a soft try when hooker George Turner overthrew, which was picked up by Dan Sheehan, who had the simplest of chores to score his sixth try of the tournament.
Jack Crowley scored from wide out on the right for 7-3. Ireland’s lack of discipline has been a glaring problem throughout the competition, and Russell converted his second penalty in the 18th minute after another Irish infraction.
Neither side was able to impose themselves on the game as defences held firm and there were few, if any, scoring opportunities, leaving the game very much in the balance at the end of a messy first half.
The Irish, on the other hand, began the second quarter on a high note, with Crowley converting a penalty following some superb attacking play to make it 10-6.
Russell’s tendency to make schoolboy mistakes then gave the Irish the advantage, as he kicked the ball out straight away.
As the Scots defence collapsed, the Irish applied pressure, but Tadhg Furlong was disallowed a try after being deemed to have knocked on as he attempted to touch down the ball.