by Our Sports Desk

Darren Cave yesterday warned the TV pundits to stick to the facts when criticising Ireland’s World Cup performances, in an impassioned defence of teammate Jared Payne.

Centre Cave admitted he would have been annoyed to be hit with the kind of flak that Payne received from TV3 analyst and former Ulster boss Matt Williams after Ireland’s 44-10 victory over Romania.

Ex-Scotland coach Williams slammed Payne for “making really poor decisions” and kicking too frequently against Romania — but Cave believes the New Zealand-born centre is in prime form.

“In fairness to Jared I’d be surprised if he’s paid much attention to it but if it was me I would probably be pretty annoyed,” said Cave.

“It can be frustrating when guys are just throwing out opinions which aren’t based on facts of what actually happened in the game, then suddenly that becomes everyone else’s opinion of guys who’ve had a couple of beers and watched the game.

“Then after a week it’s the perception of half the nation and it’s just completely false.

“At the end of the day it can be frustrating at times but Jared will do the right thing, he’ll keep his head down, he’ll keep working hard and he’ll keep playing well for Ireland.

“The first I heard about it was after Tommy (Bowe) had been in Monday’s press conference because Tommy and I had actually had a chat last week about how much we were both looking forward to playing beside him.

“So Tommy brought it up but it’s not something that consumes us.

“I actually thought the Canada game was potentially Jared’s best game in green.

“I haven’t seen fully what was said about him but I’ve seen a few things.

“And it’s just opinion at the end of the day, it’s not really based on fact.

“So we’ll deal with facts not opinions.”

Ireland’s next match is against Italy on Sunday.