LinuxQuestions.org - [SOLVED] Freenode, sasl, irssi & 14.1

After several years of successfully authenticating to Freenode with sasl I have been unable to do this with 14.1. An ssl connection is made but sasl simple does not send the password as expected and I have to complete the login manually.

Code:

21:23 -!- Irssi: Looking up irc.freenode.net

21:23 -!- Irssi: SASL: auth loaded from /home/andrew/.irssi/sasl.auth

21:23 -!- Irssi: Connecting to irc.freenode.net [93.152.160.101] port 7000

21:23 -!- Irssi: Connection to irc.freenode.net established

21:23 !hitchcock.freenode.net *** Looking up your hostname...

21:23 !hitchcock.freenode.net *** Checking Ident

21:23 !hitchcock.freenode.net *** Found your hostname

21:23 !hitchcock.freenode.net *** No Ident response

21:23 -!- Irssi: CLICAP: supported by server: account-notify extended-join 

          identify-msg multi-prefix sasl 

21:23 -!- Irssi: CLICAP: requesting: multi-prefix sasl

21:23 -!- Irssi: CLICAP: now enabled: multi-prefix sasl  

21:23 -!- Irssi: SASL authentication failed

21:23 -!- Irssi: SASL authentication aborted

21:23 -!- Welcome to the freenode Internet Relay Chat Network andrew_46

I have followed these directions (except for the tor details):

http://docs.slackware.com/howtos:software:irssi_on_tor

which is a little ironic as my own (former) web page on irssi is credited at the base :) Can anybody save me from my frustration, or at least tell me that there is a known problem with irssi under 14.1??