Amid the fallout from England's premature departure from their own Rugby World Cup came the belief that Ireland would be the one of the home nations to make it to the semifinals.

It was predicted that Wales, shorn of so many players through injury, would lose to South Africa and Scotland would go down to an in-form Australian side, it was all pretty straightforward.

So the burden of expectation that hung around the neck of England transferred to the Irish team. It literally seemed like the whole of Ireland had decamped to Cardiff to see us beat our nemesis, Argentina.

What transpired was an Irish defeat in a team shorn of its leaders -- both spiritual and ability wise -- in Paul O'Connell, Johnny Sexton, Sean O'Brien and Peter O'Mahony. The build-up to the game took place without a group of players who give confidence and belief to those around them and strike fear into opposition. The one thing all coaches need are their best players and Joe Schmidt didn't lose just one of them, he lost them all.

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Still Schmidt's Ireland battled to come back into the game from a 17-0 deficit early on and got themselves back to 23-20 down with little more than 20 minutes to go. Despite that calamitous start, there was still hope but the truth was it was obduracy (and Luke Fitzgerald's magnificent cameo from the bench) that kept them in it. The better team on the day won.

Argentina played a game that married all their traditional strengths of forward power and ball carrying ability to a fluidity to bring their backs such as Juan Imhoff, Santiago Cordero and Joaquin Tuculet into the game at will. It was brilliant but hard to watch as an Irishman and you wonder when a better chance will arrive for us to get to our first Rugby World Cup semifinal. We will never see Paul O'Connell in green again and that is sad to say, not just for Irish supporters but for rugby supporters in general.

So where to now for Ireland? As with all teams that don't live up to expectation the level of reaction and disappointment is disproportionate. Scotland knocked out at the same stage are lauded in defeat (I am not even going to discuss the last-minute decision that ultimately cost them) and are seen to be a good place, for Ireland it is soul-searching and disappointment. Sport is funny.

The results and the fact that no northern hemisphere team has made the semifinals mean that people think the whole game in this part of the world needs to be rethought. South Africa were pushed all the way by Wales and Scotland almost prevailed over Australia but didn't, so the gulf isn't as big as people want to make it out to be.

There aren't, as some are saying, too many foreign players in the Aviva Premiership, which stops England from been successful. The same arguments are trotted out all the time because it is easy to do so. True, there are lessons to be learnt but the biggest one is one that I have beat the drum for a number of years on: what sort of game do we want to see?

Officiating in the northern hemisphere has always been about ensuring a fair contest for the ball. But in doing that, the game has always been biased towards the defensive team. Sometimes you are better off not having the ball as officials look more for the effect, not the cause and teams with attacking intent lose out.

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We need to flip that entirely and then you will see more and more coaches and teams taking risks and trusting their skills. Anyone who thinks that means defence isn't important is missing the point. Defence reflects your attitude, as it is the less glamorous part of the game. Everyone lauded the All Blacks for their brilliance last week against France and, true, they looked unstoppable. But for all the 60-odd points they scored and their coruscating brilliance, they still made more tackles than France. They put in the hard yards so the show ponies could strut their stuff, and so, too, did Argentina in defence.

For me, I would like everyone to take a step back before launching into a review of what is wrong and what is needed to be done. Yes, some things must change, yes there must be a fair contest at the breakdown but the fair contest in the northern hemisphere must favour the attack not the defence as it currently does -- then we will see our game evolve.

The margins at the highest level are small but are easily bridged. The home nations, France and Italy will all be ready and excited again come Six Nations time but in the meantime I am looking forward to the four best teams in the world doing battle in the semifinals of what has been a brilliant Rugby World Cup.