Ronan O Gara scored all the Irish points - through a try, four penalties and a conversion - as they ground out an RBS 6 Nations victory which clinched the Triple Crown.

Chris Paterson replied with six penalties in a flawless kicking display as Scotland posed Eddie OSullivans men a bigger challenge than both Wales and England had managed.

Nevertheless Hadden was frustrated that his team had not performed to a higher standard as Ireland claimed their third Triple Crown in four years.

Scotland have not beaten Ireland since 2001 and the visitors success in Edinburgh was their seventh consecutive win in matches between the teams.

He said: The camp is obviously bitterly disappointed at the outcome of todays game but most disappointing thing of all was that we didnt play well enough.

Ireland were there for the beating but we didnt do enough or perform with enough accuracy or precision during the game to get a grip of it.

It was the sort of game where the scoreline was always going to be back and forward and you just werent too sure who would be in front at the end.

But we see it as a missed opportunity against the second-best side in the world to give the sort of quality performance of which we know we are capable.

We were very disappointed with the quality of our defence. Obviously if we had happened to be in front at the end of the game we would have accepted the win but we would still be disappointed.

We started poorly and I wanted to see a performance right from the start. But, perhaps, to be fair we underestimated what the defeat by the Italians took from our confidence.

Theres only so much confidence you have and when you take a pasting from all and sundry following the Italian defeat it is difficult to rebound and I said before the game wed find out how much it had affected us.

I was surprised by the lack of urgency we showed at the start. But there were some good cameo moments throughout the game as it swung one way and another but in terms of what we were capable of it was disappointing.

Ireland coach O'Sullivan added: "We would have been disappointed if we didn't win. The game is always a dogfight at Murrayfield.

"We talked about what it would be like all week and knew the media hoopla going into the game was a load of nonsense.

"We never bought into it. Scotland felt they had let themselves down against Italy and needed a big performance against us.

"This was their last home game in the Six Nations and they wanted a win before going to France next weekend.

"They produced their best performance of the championship and if we'd adopted the mentality of the media we would have lost.

"I was not surprised it was such a dogfight. Our discipline was poor - when you give six kicks at goal to Paterson there's only one outcome.

"When we fell behind and the clock was running out, a big question was being asked of the boys.

"Would we pack up and go home or rally? It wasn't pretty but it was effective. I wasn't happy with the performance but we came out on top."

Ireland will assess the fitness of O'Driscoll (shoulder) and Gordon D'Arcy (bumps and bruises) tomorrow (Sunday) with both centres receiving treatment on the pitch.