Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Interesting. How many other World Rugby Players of the Year haven’t really done it at the elite level?

Ospreys had 28 scrum penalties won before this contest. How many do the provinces have? They'd have murdered all of the provinces scrum.

Harry Byrne was very poor. Healy was very poor and Osborne had a shocker. Leinster were poor overall. But, still managed to win.

Loughman is the biggest winner from tonites match.

Conan was poor in stages! But, he pulled his jocks up and delivered.

Leinster were poor. Akrasia is right! But still, they won.

Conan was sublime in the last quarter. He's got speed and power. Which was very evident. He put to Ospreys and made hay.

As I stated earlier, Ospreys are leading the league in scrum penalties. Fat load of good it does for them! They are probably going to be on the bubble. For a side that provides a large amount of international players, they are shockingly disappointing. They had Leinster on the ropes and couldn't finish the job. Leinster have a good 10 minutes or so and win.

That scrum would demolish any province scrum. Ireland are not getting it right as far as scrummaging goes. I'd guess that Scott Wilson at Ulster is our best bet at tight head at the moment. Munster have produced none, Leinster also and Connacht are using Illo, who went right into the pro set up. In Leinster defense, Aungier left, as did Salanoa and Illo took a guaranteed contract.

The union should be looking to get better scrumm coaches. It's disappointing to watch our sides struggle against the top teams.

Never seen a run of posts quite like this.

Remarkable.

Yet when Coombes came up to international level, he stunk the place out so badly, they had to fumigate the RDS after.

Conan has been nowhere near his Lions standard for the last 2 seasons, maybe yesterday was the catalyst to get back there, as it is he's not the form player.

Agreed, but he has had chances with Ireland since those games and (apparently) not taken them.

So he's back to square one to some extent. I would expect him to be named in the 6N squad but he'll only get ahead of Conan and whoever else based on what he does in camp.

My point is that talking about "form" is a bit pointless when most of the games the provinces play are light years from test level.

My point is that talking about "form" is a bit pointless when most of the games the provinces play are light years from test level.

Maybe good form has less relevance. But bad form, at a lower level, would seem entirely relevant.

Funny how you haven't been coming into the Ireland thread to lay into Ulster players after their poor performances of late, or Munster players after their losses this season (of which there have many).

Yet when Leinster have an off day but still win, you go to town on a young guy who is realistically nowhere near the Ireland squad.

I was quite a nifty player myself in school. Had trials for Leinster u18 when I was 15 (wasn't selected). They should call me up for the 6N.

Coombes also had a very good performance in his first senior cap and was one of the best players to feature in the Maori games on the NZ tour. However all that is conveniently forgotten in order that some posters can dismiss him due to a poor performance two months ago (where everyone stunk up the place), despite the fact that he's been one of the best performing back rowers since.

This place really is a midden. It's no wonder it doesn't get anywhere near the same amount of traffic it used to. Blind provincialism masquerading as informed opinion.