Not winning the world cup is not a choke.
A choke would be losing to both Scotland and SA and not getting out of the group.
A QF against either NZ or France is basically a 50/50 call. France being the more difficult match on their home turf. But beating the All-Blacks is never easy and shouldn't be taken for granted.
You hit the nail on the head, he hasn't stood out against the best opposition. Be against Leinster, or teams in the HC. I'm not saying he's bad by any means, but I can't think of any game that's he's been the stand out player. Compared to the guys he's competing against, likely Deegan and Prendergast, who've stood out in comparatively poorer teams consistently.
I guess you missed his block down that led to the try which won the match. Do you follow rugby?
I think he needs to be in as many camps as possible so Ireland can work out how best to use him and Coombes can learn to adapt a bit to a different system.
In fairness to Farrell, Coombes has been in every Ireland squad since the summer of 2021, it's not like he's been completely out in the cold or hasn't had a chance to adapt to the system.
I would just ignore that poster, and certainly stop quoting him.
Be against Leinster, or teams in the HC
You should really check out his stats in the HC. This is just not true.
His stats for the pool games (including 2 games again Toulouse) were off the charts.
The 46 players that were in camp (37 initial squad plus 9 called up) will surely be largely the 45.
The two players I think could miss out due to shortage of playing time would probably be Scott Penny and either Carbery or Frawley.
I could also see Timoney losing out to Hodnett.
On current form Shane Daly has to be in there as well, I don't know whether that would mean dropping Larmour or Earls.
There's a case for Kleyn over Treadwell also.
Archer is playing better than Salanoa also.
I'd have Loughman ahead of Kilcoyne and Milne too.
Nah, I don't agree at all. He's a very different player to Caelan Doris, who is still by a distance our best 8, but Gavin Coombes is still a really special player. He's as good a short yardage carrier as you'll see anywhere in the game, and has plenty of other strings to his bow too.
There is no way he won't be in the 45 man squad today.
I thought Coombes was one of the few Munster players who probably didn't advance his cause much on Saturday. Didn't think he had much impact at all. Guys like Loughman, Kleyn, Hodnett, Crowley, Nash, Daly and Haley probably gave Farrell and co more food for thought. But I don't think their mind will have been changed much re: Coombes.
If I'm picking the 33-man squad now...
Sheehan, Kelleher, Herring
Porter, Healy, Loughman, Furlong, Bealham, O'Toole
Ryan, Beirne, Baird, Henderson
POM, Prendergast, VDF, Doris, Conan
JGP, Murray, Casey
Sexton, Crowley, R.Byrne
Aki, McCloskey, Henshaw, Ringrose
Lowe, Hansen, JOB, Nash, Keenan
When you write it down like that there really isn't a huge amount to debate..
Does Baird go as a second row? If he goes as a backrow then maybe Treadwell/Kleyn go instead of Prendergast
Do they bring 4 specialist centers?
Who goes as the final back 3 player? i.e. Nash/Stockdale/Larmour/etc. etc.
And really none of these decisions will make or break our World Cup
Could see Frawley or Osbourne sneak in ahead of McCloskey. And McCarthy in at lock if Baird is seen as a 6 but can’t see any other bolters
We've got out of our group before and choked. It has been a regular occurrence in quarter finals. We don't want a repeat this time so the mental game is something that Farrell can't ignore. Obviously losing a close game to New Zealand or France may not be a bottle job but we're the best team in the World. The players will see anything less than winning the World Cup as failure and we should too.
We might be world number 1 and 6N champions, but there is very little between Ire/NZ/France, we are all on one side of the draw, and failure is a very strong word.
Losing to Wales or Argentina can be seen as choking. Losing to the All Blacks or the French on their home patch can not.
That said, I truly hope Farrell doesn't follow the same tired path of picking established names regardless of form. Picking guys like Kilcoyne, Salanoa, Treadwell, Prendergast, Timoney and Larmour ahead of lads in their positions who are showing far greater form would be a worrying first step on the campaign.
Our aim is to win the World Cup. Not doing so would be failure. There's no way to dress it up.
It depends on the manner of the defeat but I agree, it's important to pick form players and change things up if needed.
My predicted 45:
Hooker: R Kelleher, D Sheehan, T Stewart, R Herring
LHP: A Porter, C Healy, J Loughman, M Milne
THP: T Furlong, F Bealham, T O'Toole, R Salanoa
Lock: J Ryan, T Beirne, I Henderson, R Baird, J McCarthy, J Kleyn
Back Row: J Van der Flier, C Doris, P O'Mahony, J Conan, C Prendergast, G Coombes, J Hodnett
Scrum Half: J Gibson-Park, C Murray, C Casey, C Blade
Out Half: J Sexton, J Crowley, R Byrne, H Byrne
Centre: G Ringrose, R Henshaw, B Aki, S McCloskey, J Osbourne, C Frawley
Back Three: H Keenan, M Hansen, J Lowe, J O'Brien, C Nash, R Baloucoune
Deegan and Prendergast score significantly fewer tries than Coombes
Using the very blunt instrument of Tries per minutes played in their career,
Coombes 1 try per 126 mins (and this is wiith him playing significant amounts of minutes this year in the 2nd row, the position least likely to score tries)
Deegan 1 try per 164 mins
Prendergast 1 try every 609 minutes
Penny plays a different role to Coombes, They're not in competition with each other for a spot
I don't ascribe a lot of value to tries score from 2ms out, where a player tends to get pushed over by a latching player. I don't think it's a reason to pick a particular player.
For comparison Penny is 1 every 141 minutes this season and 1 in 122 last. He doesn't offer anything like the carrying threat of Coombes and tends to play against weaker opposition (though he has scored three times against Munster).
Think that's pretty close to be fair.
I think there's a discussion on whether you bring an extra "pure" 2nd row instead of another B/R at the expense of Prendergast - One of Treadwell, McCarthy and an outside bet on Kleyn.
Similarly think there's a big discussion to be had on Nash vs Lamour - Nash definitely had the much better finish to the season but Larmour would have credit in the bank.
Otherwise though I think all the other names are pretty well nailed on barring injuries.
Just on the centres and back 3. You are suggesting 6 centres and 6 back three players.
For the 40 man squad to new zealand last summer. They brought 7 back 3 players and 5 centres.
I think one your centres might miss out for an extra back 3 player.
Id say Frawley takes H Byrnes place with the outhalves and Larmour gets into the back 3.
Yeah, you could be right. I'm not sure if the squad to NZ will be overly instructive though in terms of squad composition, as the thinking there would have been as much about having a squad large enough to facilitate the Maori games, whereas this is a pure training squad.
Having a player like Coombes means it causes compressions in defense. He needs to be watched by 3 forwards which creates space elsewhere
Conan at 8 doesn't do this, he tends to score his tries on the edges where he can overpower wingers or full backs
Coombes allows space for other players to attack because he is such a ball carrying threat
He also has an excellent passing handling and can pop balls out once he's committed defenders.
Coombes isn't loved by Munster just because of what he does, but because of what he allows other players to do around him.
Its the same with Will Skelton. Even when he doesn't have the ball, he forces the opposition to focus on him and that creates opportunities elsewhere.
Munster have improved this year for 3 main reasons.
1. Our conditioning has improved a lot.
2 Our tactics have changed to pass the ball a lot more and keep the ball alive
3 We have multiple ball carrying threats in the 2nd row and Back Back row. Having one ball carrier is no good because they get taken out at rucks and suddenly you're forced to go wide or kick because all your big players are getting back to their feet. The benefit of having 2 big 2nd Rows alongside Coombes at 8 and the likes of Fineen Wycherly at 6 means we have 4 huge mobile players on the pitch at once who can all carry the ball and offload.
(Leinster have tried this too, playing Baird at 6 for essentially a 3 lock pack)
Having better conditioning allows us to play more phase play and that creates gaps and opens up opportunities to attack. Munster have scored the most tries from 10+ phases of any team in the URC. Compare this with leinster who score a lot off 1st or 2nd phase because they kick the ball a lot and attack on the transition.
I think Ireland were lucky to win that grand slam this year. France bottled that game tactically. They played directly into our hands and I don't think they'll do that again. (In the Final of the Champions cup, LAR started the game using the wrong tactics of kicking the ball out of play and giving Leinster the set piece, when they stopped doing that mid way through the 1st half, they began dominating the game)
Conan at 8 doesn't do this
Neither does Coombes really. The vast majority of his impact comes a metre from the opposition try line. You rarely see him making big carries around the park, nor do you see him getting his hands free in contact and releasing others. Of the Munster back 5 on Saturday, he was the least impactful.
Tell me you don't watch Munster without telling me you don't watch Munster :)
no hodnett, no kleyn
n
Apart from Osbourne nothing really surprising.
I cannot understand the lack of a second openside flanker in the squad. Is the idea that one of JVDF or POM will play virtually every game of the tournament so?
Outside of that; Kieran Treadwell, Dave Kilcoyne, Ciaran Frawley, Jacob Stockdale and Jamie Osborne are all relatively fortunate I think to be in there.
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