Ireland's 22-15 loss to the Wallabies at Suncorp Stadium caps off a testing and winless tour, but captain Brian O'Driscoll is taking plenty of positives from his side's performance.
The Irish scored 15 points from five penalties to lead for the majority of the first half, but failed to register anything in the second frame as the Wallabies eventually found some form and pressed the attack.
The Irish, like the Wallabies, have had their depth tested by a spate of injuries, and O'Driscoll said the experience gained in key positions could only have a positive effect in games to come.
"Obviously we've been unfortunate, particularly in certain areas, to have as many injuries, particularly in the back-row," he said.
"But in fairness to (the players filling in), tonight I thought they really fronted up."
"We got four new caps out of this tour. I've always been one for taking positives out of any situation whether you win or lose and definitely giving guys pitch time in Test matches against opposition we're going to play in next year's World Cup has to be a plus."
But while the captain was looking on the bright side, he wasn't turning a blind eye to his side's failing and spoke of a need to make improvements across the board as they build towards next year's World Cup.
"When we did get possession we did make some uncharacteristic errors and that didn't help us play any phases," he said.
"Against the best defensive teams you have to play a lot of phases to try to get mismatches; I wouldn't think we got beyond phase five or six too many times today and that's a disappointment."
"We have time to look at all facets of our game, it's not just the scrum and lineout that we need to look after, it's restarts, our defensive systems and our attacking game - everything."
"You have to try to piece it all together and so I don't think we're going to be pressing panic buttons at this stage, but (set-pieces are) definitely an area I'm sure we can improve on."
Head coach Declan Kidney was another in the Irish camp pleased with aspects of the performance and tour, but still disappointed to be shaded by the Australians in a match that neither team ever looked comfortable in.
Kidney made mention of the Irish injury problems and blooding of several players, but wasn't looking to take the shine off the Wallabies' victory.
"You're never happy when you represent your country and the result hasn't gone your way," he said.
"We did have a bit of a plan (regarding player development), but I wouldn't be hiding behind that in terms of tonight's result.'
"We had a team that I felt was good enough to win tonight, and fair play to Australia they got the better of us."
"I thought Australia were playing rough, they put us under a lot of pressure I think they won the field position battle and the possession battle."
"They were clinical, they took their chances when they came their way and credit to them for that."
Although its attacking game failed to ever really ignite, Ireland will take pride in its defensive effort to restrict the talented Australian backline to just two tries, one of which came from an intercept.
But for O'Driscoll, Ireland's ability to absorb pressure in defence was of little consolation without the ball-security to set up point-scoring opportunities in attack.
"In fairness, our defensive efforts were good, but when you're needing to create a score from nothing it's difficult against top-quality opposition and we just made it hard for ourselves by not holding on to the ball," O'Driscoll said.