2021 AUTUMN NATIONS SERIES: Saturday, November 6
IRELAND v JAPAN, Aviva Stadium, 1pm (live RTÉ 2/RTÉ Player/Channel 4/RTÉ Radio 1/IRFU Live Blog)
Tickets are on sale from Ticketmaster.ie
Come on Ireland! ☘️
Pure classy from Japan, and a great chat from Sexton.
Back three all played excellent, Keenan is just so comfortable. Conway was brilliant.
the pack were just so good and played at great tempo.
Fair enough, could you just show me where this was said prior to kick off? Before kick off the narrative was they pushed Australia close and that Ireland would have a hard time. Im just looking through the comments and dont see any message that says Japan were a poor side.
If you were winning with 20 minutes left against NZ then the first player you want coming on is Murray.
If you are losing with 20 minutes to go he is the last player you want coming on.
The question is can you have a lead vs NZ on 60 minutes that you try to defend.
Bizarre to see comments expecting non-leinster fans to be upset by the result.
I saw barely any guff about that outside of WUMs/journos.
A few on here manufacturing schadenfreude.
In two minds here.
Impressed with the full back line, Keenan especially.
Impressed with the teamwork with Lowe and Aki.
Impressed with the work rate of the pack.
Impressed with JGP and Sexton.
But there was something or other missing today and I can't put a finger on it.
Kellehers throwing was excellent bar one over throw. Japan just disrupted one or two and O'Mahony and Ryan failed to catch two straight forward ones.
A viable opposition?
To be honest, Japan were awful.
Yes we didn't allow them to play their game, but their individual error count was off the charts.
Next week will be the true test, and to be fair, that's about as good a build up game as you can have.
No serious injuries, able to see what moves came off and what didn't, see who stood up and who didn't...
Its the box kicks.....it's going to take some time to get it out of our system.
Ryan’s one should have been a penalty to us.
Agreed. One should have been a pen for a pull down and Ryan should have been stronger. The other Ryan should have taken.
One over throw was all that was wrong with Kelleher today
Yea true but I don’t think you should be picking a player based on trying to determine if you’ll be winning or losing with 20 mins to go. I’d have any of Casey, blade, McGrath instead. I reckon Doak will have what Murray has with size, strength, kicking plus he seems to have a more creative part to his game and is quicker.
Keenans pass for Conways second try was spectacular. A twenty yarder while he's sprinting and also drawing in a defender.
Conways pass for Aki’s try was phenomenal too.
I'd agree with most of this, but Lowe cannot be anywhere near the team next week... he still can't defend. If he played for anyone but leinster this would be glaringly obvious.
I dont think that was as good a build up as you can have. it was a glorified run out for a lot of players and you would imagine some of the training sessions they have done were at a higher intensity.
Steel sharpens steel.
Possibly yeah. They were not at all good with what little possession that they got.
Who comes in so? Earls? Zebo? That leaves an opening in the center and im not sure who covers that.
I think lowe suits how we approached today, he is comfortable carrying and effective anywhere offensively and we looked to bring him in field to find mismatches.
His defense is the question, and maybe an AI series is the time to get that right because ge brings a lot to the table that cant just be discarded. Every players has elements that need to be worked on.
If lowe gets his D in order he will be a world class player and thats worth the risk IMO.
He is there to enforce the laws of the game fairly, keeping a game flowing not in his remit, proportionate in his card decisions ? Proportionate to what ? Exactly ?
Anytime we've played two hard teams in a row, we've pretty much always dropped our level in the second week.
We don't have an 80 man squad like England to be able to swap like with like for the forth coming game.
If we had have shipped an injury to 1,3,8,10,12,13 or 15 the replacements cause the team to be weaker (in my opinion)
Its also worth noting that this move to expanding the amount of offloading suits Zebo more than any other player in the country, he has an exceptional ability to identify play and time his support lines brilliantly.
You don't need an 80 man squad, both England and SA made it through 3 knock out games with only 27 different players used (if not less).
We are weaker because we don't blood enough players, its pretty self explanatory.
Except England didnt.
It's patently true that in some positions the back ups are not as good as the incumbents, no matter if they played every second of test rugby between now and 2023.
This simple point seems to be lost on a lot of people
Where did you get this need for 80 players hyperbole, The same place you got the French Hyperbole I presume?
I would be fine with that if the back up is actually getting game time. If the back up isnt getting game time a. we will never know & b. Not only will the back up not be as impactful but he wont have the experience required either. The only way that will be known is by using a crystal ball, simply writing off a player after afew games and then assuming that means they wont be good enough long run is just plain ignorant, some will be ready after 5 caps and some might take 15 or so.
Picking carbery today was a mistake.
Picking him next week will be completely negligent.
"we" don't have to know anything.
One thing is certain.
if they dont play between now and 2023 they definitely wont be ready
I'm reminded of Russell Crowe's line in Gladiator
ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?!!!
It would also help if the alternate kit was an Irish colour and not something that looks like a colour usually used by our biggest rival
