Ireland vs Wales, Friday 13th Nov 2020 7pm

molloyjh

Bit of a mixed bag tonight. Some really great work to create some of the opportunities that we did. A few players really stepped up such as Doris and Lowe. I thought Farrell was decent too. But oddly after some great work from Henshaw in Paris, he wasn't great tonight.

Our discipline at times was really poor and really hurt us. I also thought we got a but lucky at a couple of scrums where Porter was clearly overextended, leading to collapses.

Our difficulties in finishing off the opportunities we had was frustrating. We should have had at least 2 more tries.

But a 32-9 win over Wales is still a good result. We are seeing some clear progress in our performance. I thought Sexton was excellent when he was on and linked so well with Lowe a few times. It was great to see him attack the line and pop up on shoulders off line breaks. I thought POM has responded well to his poor form and his slipping down the pecking order. Burns did pretty well too. Def the best alternative to Sexton so far. I missed a good chunk of the last quarter so didn't see Murray at 10. Was he honestly good???

connemara man

molloyjh wrote: »

Bit of a mixed bag tonight. Some really great work to create some of the opportunities that we did. A few players really stepped up such as Doris and Lowe. I thought Farrell was decent too. But oddly after some great work from Henshaw in Paris, he wasn't great tonight.

Our discipline at times was really poor and really hurt us. I also thought we got a but lucky at a couple of scrums where Porter was clearly overextended, leading to collapses.

Our difficulties in finishing off the opportunities we had was frustrating. We should have had at least 2 more tries.

But a 32-9 win over Wales is still a good result. We are seeing some clear progress in our performance. I thought Sexton was excellent when he was on and linked so well with Lowe a few times. It was great to see him attack the line and pop up on shoulders off line breaks. I thought POM has responded well to his poor form and his slipping down the pecking order. Burns did pretty well too. Def the best alternative to Sexton so far. I missed a good chunk of the last quarter so didn't see Murray at 10. Was he honestly good???

Murray had little to do at 10 we box kicked a lot more took the decisions away from the channel

sydthebeat

I thought it was great tonight to see that POM had the ability to raise his game now that his position on the team is at risk. His line out work is without question, though there was one cheap turn over on our throw.
However looking at being comfortable with ball in hand it is clear as night and day that Doris is the better player. That carry that POM made in the first half, taking the ball in the five channel on the right, but jumping into contact and spilling on the ground, is not something that farrell or catt wants to see if we're trying to play with continuity.

It's great to have such a dog fight for positions now that some players are looking over their shoulder and raising their game appropriately

Neil3030

POM, playing as he did tonight, is an instant starter.

The question is, how often does and can POM play as he did tonight?

gadarnol

Speed of recycling was very much improved with Murray gone. Wales were quite poor which made our scrum look better than it is in the first half. Good decisions about putting points on the board too. I don’t think we’ll do very well against England but as Erasmus said they can fall away. At least you can see where the coaches are demanding change. Positive.

ElisaAtWar

Finally a team worth following. It's taken a while

thomond2006

ElisaAtWar wrote: »

Finally a team worth following. It's taken a while

I suggest you jump off the bandwagon again because next week won't be pretty.

blindsider

We were v poor in the first half against a callow Welsh team. We took a pen when we had W rocked in the scrum, and did the opposite later on....seriously WTF?

We seem to be under strict orders to carry into contact and it's really predictable. JGP was hesitant and took a step before passing - his box kicking was poor and Conway was increasingly frustrated.

I'm no fan of Lowe's but he did give us options - he can offload well and is aggressive in attack. His defence is seriously dodgy though - he was caught out of position and let the ball bounce 3 times close to the 22! If I was Eddie J, I'd be telling someone to keep winding him up next week....50/50 who gets the YC...?

We struggled to score tries against a poor, disorganised Welsh side at home - ENG in "Twickers" will be a heck of a lot more of a challenge...even w/o the Chariot!

Pleez bring Cooney and Stander in for next week!!!!

degsie

Once again referring was inconsistent, it will be the death knell of decent free flowing rugby.

Dog Botherer

ElisaAtWar wrote: »

Finally a team worth following. It's taken a while

Relax. It was a mixed performance against an abject Wales. We’ll almost definitely see a more conservative side lose by 15-20 against a very strong England next week.

Dog Botherer

blindsider wrote: »

I'm no fan of Lowe's but he did give us options - he can offload well and is aggressive in attack. His defence is seriously dodgy though - he was caught out of position and let the ball bounce 3 times close to the 22! If I was Eddie J, I'd be telling someone to keep winding him up next week....50/50 who gets the YC!!!!

If you think James Lowe is going to get wound up enough to get carded you obviously have seen very little of him. He’s a World Class Wind Up Merchant. You seem to have mistaken him for a Common ****house, known colloquially in Wales as Liam Williams.

blindsider

Dog Botherer wrote: »

If you think James Lowe is going to get wound up enough to get carded you obviously have seen very little of him. He’s a World Class Wind Up Merchant. You seem to have mistaken him for a Common ****house, known colloquially in Wales as Liam Williams.

Seen plenty thanks, and know what EJ's mindset is too.

He got plenty involved in the first half today on the the touchline, and that will have been noted by England.

(I'm not saying he was wrong - just that he got dragged in to it far too easily. EJ is the cynical, nasty sod who would look to get him carded and then exploit the weakness of the YC.)

Dog Botherer

blindsider wrote: »

Seen plenty thanks, and know what EJ's mindset is too.

He got plenty involved in the first half today on the the touchline, and that will have been noted by England.

(I'm not saying he was wrong - just that he got dragged in to it far too easily. EJ is the cynical, nasty sod who would look to get him carded and then exploit the weakness of the YC.)

When he gave Liam Williams the little shove and a comment and Williams absolutely flipped? Yeah can’t imagine how a player like that wouldn’t be useful with Owen Farrell around.

To my knowledge Lowe has never been carded for anything other than in the air tackles, could well be wrong on that. He’s absolutely not going to be taking swings at English lads. That’s nonsense.

Paul Smeenus

I'm a bit more reserved about Lowe than the sticky love-in that many enjoy, but I just saw his post-game interview talking about his thoughts during the anthems and wishing his family could be in the stadium, and you'd have to be completely stone-hearted not to appreciate how he wears his heart on his sleeve.

Strumms

Morathi wrote: »

Jaysus Wales were sh1te.

They didn’t seem to have any cohesive plan to attack, too slow, labored.

Also at almost every penalty and lineout in the last 30 minutes of the second half that they were awarded there was a conversation that seemed to last an eternity between Alun Wyn Jones and his teammates, no matter where on the pitch they were awarded it..

guapos

ElisaAtWar wrote: »

Finally a team worth following. It's taken a while

Pick a team, any team, get to know them, enjoy the way the way they play and their players and have fun watching them OR follow Ireland and enjoy the ride.

We can all be frustrated with performances but "finally a team worth following " are the words of an arsehole, which I have a have feeling you may be

leakyboots

I like Lowe, gives us a bit of a bastard in the backs. Powerful going forward, good offload and boot. Nice alternative to Earls who hasn't had many challengers in recent years and probably hasn't much road left. I wonder about his defence (wait and see on that I guess) but weigh up the pros and cons and I think he'll do a fine job when on form. Away in Twickers will be a bigger test when we're more under the kosh, very poor Welsh team tonight

Morathi

blindsider wrote: »

I'm no fan of Lowe's but he did give us options - he can offload well and is aggressive in attack. His defence is seriously dodgy though - he was caught out of position and let the ball bounce 3 times close to the 22! If I was Eddie J, I'd be telling someone to keep winding him up next week....50/50 who gets the YC...?

Genuine question, why are you not a fan?

Dunno where you're getting the YC idea from, he's had one in his whole tenure in Ireland.

lawrencesummers

No mention of how Keenan carried the ball into contact multiple times and lost it. Poor performance from him.

Wales are dire but committed. They did a good job of disrupting us (and we did a fine job of disrupting ourselves at times).

We still hammered them and never looked under threat despite losing both out halves.

I think Welsh rugby is going to have to recalibrate expectations for a while - that team isn't winning anything.

Buer

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Wales are dire but committed. They did a good job of disrupting us (and we did a fine job of disrupting ourselves at times)..

Commitment is useless without any structure or focus. They were atrocious. Horrible discipline, horrible set piece and horrible on both sides of the ball in play. There didn't seem to be any attacking plan at all. They only had 39% possession yet still kicked more ball away than us.

Ireland were largely competent and efficient. I think it says a lot when the reaction is fairly muted as we didn't beat Wales by more than 23.

The big positives to take are that we got to see a few things we haven't previously. Lowe went really well. A couple of defensive lapses but he gave us something nobody else has in attack. I thought Farrell linked well and was a great asset for tidying ball up for us, putting us back on the front foot. He should start next week.

Doris is better at 8 than 6. His handling is something we haven't had since Heaslip. Stander is undroppable. I'd like to see them swap positions which is harsh on POM after last night. James Ryan needs to get his form back and take more responsibility out of touch. He hasn't been poor but he's certainly not at the heights he was.

Kelleher was good but the throwing issues are still there. Mostly went well but a couple lost and there was definitely at least one if not two others that were blatantly crooked and not called.

Happy to see Burns get a run out. He looked competent and eager to get involved. Defended well. He certainly doesn't run the back line as effectively though and we lost a lot of attacking threat after Sexton went off. Wales were chasing shadows in midfield for the first 30 minutes.

Healy and Porter were very solid. There scrummaging was excellent but a few nice moments in the loose too such as Healy forcing a breakdown penalty.

VDF was very quiet and isn't going to get back into the side particularly with Vunipola on the horizon and Connors being a specialist in stopping guys.

Solid performance all told. But it has to be viewed through the prism of the quality of opposition. The scrum and back row performances won't be allowed influence to the same level next week.

OldRio

We've just scored over 30 points against Wales and never looked like shipping a try. Played really well in patches. When we play at speed it's a joy to watch.
Yet.
Slightly disappointed to be honest. Far to many points left out there esp in the first half and as for the performance at the start of the second half, well it was awful. Unfortunately this trait in our game is becoming a habit.

As for Wales? 6 losses on the bounce and they looked devoid of ideas. Dreadful.

Interested Observer

Only complaint after that is we didn't put 50 on them, thought we left a few scores behind.

Pretty bizarre having a go at Lowe after that, he was one of our best players, had an excellent game.

CMcsporty

Wales were disjointed in their defence and offered nothing in attack.
I don’t think it’s fair to say that Farrell should start because he played ok in that game.
V’s Aki against France

There is a case to play both Aki and Farrell v England in the interest of pure beef.
But with no Tuilagi....
The half back selection will probably dictate who he picks at 12
If it’s JGP and Byrne. Henshaw will probably start.

My preference would be for Marmion, Carty, Aki, Henshaw

Btw is JG Park first senior 80 min performance?
He did well. Snappier

salmocab

OldRio wrote: »

We've just scored over 30 points against Wales and never looked like shipping a try. Played really well in patches. When we play at speed it's a joy to watch.
Yet.
Slightly disappointed to be honest. Far to many points left out there esp in the first half and as for the performance at the start of the second half, well it was awful. Unfortunately this trait in our game is becoming a habit.

As for Wales? 6 losses on the bounce and they looked devoid of ideas. Dreadful.

To be fair we lost our 10 quite early and then our replacement 10.
Thought the pack played quite well, JGP for me added the bit of zip in the backline.
Lowe was good although the commentators creaming themselves was a bit annoying.

Ryan seemed to takeover the captaincy although the RTE commentators seemed to think it was POM but Ryan looked to be the one doing the talking to the ref.

I’m happy enough that the plan seems to be evolving and a few new caps are earning their stripes.

Bazzo

Would imagine Aki and Stander were having their minutes managed and will be back next week. They do a lot of carrying for Ireland.

CMcsporty

salmocab wrote: »

To be fair we lost our 10 quite early and then our replacement 10.
Thought the pack played quite well, JGP for me added the bit of zip in the backline.
Lowe was good although the commentators creaming themselves was a bit annoying.

Ryan seemed to takeover the captaincy although the RTE commentators seemed to think it was POM but Ryan looked to be the one doing the talking to the ref.

I’m happy enough that the plan seems to be evolving and a few new caps are earning their stripes.

Yeah POM making the decisions
Ryan doing the talking
Murray listening to both

Much better than just Sexton doing everything

Burkie1203

CMcsporty wrote: »

Yeah POM making the decisions
Ryan doing the talking
Murray listening to both

Much better than just Sexton doing everything

Ryan was captain, defo a nod to the future there. He is quoted as saying he discussed things with POM though.

salmocab

CMcsporty wrote: »

Yeah POM making the decisions

What makes you say this?

Tigerandahalf

lawrencesummers wrote: »

No mention of how Keenan carried the ball into contact multiple times and lost it. Poor performance from him.

Definitely something he needs to be coached on. Well coached players take an extra roll when they go to ground. It buys the player an extra couple of seconds so the support can arrive. Each time Keenan went to ground he just lay there and was easily turned over.

The scrum went fairly well but Ed Byrne is a definite weakness on the LH side.

Good bits and bad bits to take from the game. We still need to finish off chances better.

I thought POM showed again the great quality he brings to the lineout. He really is the best in the world on that opposition throw, so good at getting up and competing. I'd worry about our lineout options when he is not playing. Ryan doesn't look like he will dominate the lineout for us and neither Henderson, Roux or Beirne will help. Ryan has looked a bit knackered, a lot of game time over the last few years.

I like what Connors brings to the team with his low tackling. Argentina were very effective at it today against NZ. Farrell has a tough job getting the balance right between being effective enough in the lineout and having enough ball carriers in the team.