Ireland added to their growing list of scalps by defeating three World Series core teams, Kenya (24-14), Wales (27-12) and Australia (24-14), to win the Challenge Trophy at San Francisco’s AT&T Park and finish their season on a high.

In the Challenge final they overcame the early setback of losing speedster Jordan Conroy to a head injury - Bryan Mollen was already sidelined with an ankle problem - with tries from Dardis, Jimmy O’Brien, Terry Kennedy and Greg O’Shea securing victory for Stan McDowell’s charges.

Their World Cup placing of ninth, a huge leap forward from their seeding of 16th, comes on the back of a historic bronze medal at the London Sevens and Rugby Europe title wins in Moscow and Marcoussis. There is an infectious feel-good factor surrounding a squad comprising club and provincial Academy players with an average age of 23.

The ultimate goal for the IRFU Men’s Sevens Programme, headed up by director Anthony Eddy, remains a place on the World Series.

They are already through to April’s qualifying tournament in Hong Kong - it will be their second attempt having endured semi-final heartbreak against Japan.

It was a hard year for us not qualifying through Hong Kong,” admitted Dardis. “It took a lot of wind out of the sails. We had a few big tournaments in London and Paris and built into the World Cup through Rugby Europe as well.

It’s been a long year (Ireland’s first tournament was in Munich back in September) but hopefully this is a sign of greater things to come.