Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

The panel we had failed. They weren't good enough. That's the reality! It was our best opportunity too, imo.

There will be a phased period to additions and subtraction. In my opinion, scrum half is a key position to blood somebody. Murray should be phased out. Gibson Park didn't have a good world cup and I doubt he's around in 4 years. Hopefully a new scrum half is in the 6nations squad. Loose head I think will be Porter and Loughman with another. Pointless continuing with Kilcoyne and Healy.

A province badly needs to get across the line in Europe, imo. I'm no psychologist, and not to downplay the achievement of a Grand Slam, but it really does seem as though the mental pressure created by "we need to win to stay undefeated" is very different to the pressure created by "we need to win or we go home with nothing and they take it all". There's even a hint in the language you hear from players and coaches "we're treating this as a final", suggests there is just that difference between the natural context of a 6N game, to that of a knockout or final. Note I'm saying "different" here, not "more/less" etc. The caveat here is the tour win in NZ, which comes a lot closer to the context of a tournament. Could ROG have therefore derailed the momentum of the Irish setup before the RWC? Discussion for another day...

But if one of the provinces can bring home a European title, I think the changing room of the national team can only improve. I'd rather have a chunk of the players buoyed by European success, and the rest envious of that, than the entire cohort fighting their anxieties about whether they can get the job done.

tl:dr Munster should be allowed sign Ox Nche.

Andrew Porter talking about the World Cup and more on the 'Rugby Pod' on YouTube. A very very good interview. Worth a watch.

Not sure how to post a link but it's worth a watch.

I think the reason for that is because, obvisouly the Leinster players make up the bulk of the Irish set up. They need their signings to be available during / around the International window.

Signing a top quality international, who would also be away, would leave them even further stretched during that period.

It absolutely is a consideration tho; take Alaalatoa, started all 4 of the games around 6 Nations time. Fardy a perfect example of that type of player.

Add in Podge's point about the playing budget already too and it makes sense.

I tend to agree with this. The coaches taking a hard look at the gameplan and the squad will inevitably reflect on their failure to get past the ABs when it mattered. We can beat them but on the biggest stage we failed. I don't imagine Farrell et al will console themselves with 'but for Barrett's milky white thigh or the ball bouncing over Sheehan's head'...they'll say what do we need to change to win the next time. That will start sooner rather than later. Does it mean a change in the game plan and tactics? if it does it may mean more new players involved.

The Leinster need to sign Eben Etzebeth to win in europe is utter bollix. The utter arrogance of playing the exact same tactics with no changes other than "being more Physical"(Not the reason we lost in 2022). Leo and Lancaster had the deepest set of talent in europe for 2 years in a row and didn't manage to get them over the line in either of the competitions last year. I hope Nienaber comes in and brings in a different attitude, for example the arrogance of pretending the scrum doesn't matter so you can have an extra player running lines out the back. I've seen some good tactical decisions this season to counteract line speed and that could be the difference, also McCarthy is a dog at the ruck which we didn't have last year.

It's funny that we've lost to LA Rochelle on the trot. Each time different aspects to the loss. But it still remains, that Leinster fall short and usually through their own fault. For me, Jenkins was very poor last year and didn't have any impact. Lowe was poor and Molony looked wrecked at about 60 mins.

Current NIQs:

Connacht: Shamus Hurley-Langton, Santiago Cordero

Leinster: Michael Ala'alatoa, Jason Jenkins, Charlie Ngatai

Munster: Jean Kleyn, R.G. Snyman, Alex Nankivell

Ulster: Steven Kitshoff, Dave Ewers

I believe Ewers and Hurley-Langton can qualify on residency, although the former would be 38 by then so the chances of him actually representing Ireland are virtually nil. The others appear to be tied to other countries.

If Leinster easily make playoffs and their NIQs don't make their strongest XXIII for games at the business end of the season I think there's a strong argument that it'd be better for Irish rugby if they didn't have any of their current three NIQs.