Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

SMcC played really well v SA in Nov '22 before having to go off injured.

Ringrose starting will also help the defence.

Personally I'd prefer Osborne moved to 12 and JOB at FB (if fit).

Still cant see Ireland winning. Beirne looks to be running on emptymaybe not. Sheehan's a big loss and Casey in fairness also played really well (Cheap shot by RGS).

Would also like Prendergast to bench over Frawley.

I watched the match back, in the cool light of day I felt on review Ireland's execution was well below the usual expected level, especially for the first 30 minutes or so.
In no particular order, things that stuck in my mind as low points from the match;
The lapse in defence after 2 minutes was very poor, I think Henshaw could have been more controlled and just shepherded Arendse down the side-line where Osbourne was lining up to make the tackle, but once Arendse stepped inside Henshaw the running angle meant Osbourne had no chance to stop him. To be fair to Arendse, he showed shrewd awareness and clinical footwork when he spotted Henshaw rushing across to him being vulnerable to a step inside.
The O'Mahony no-look pop into McCarthy's face on the try line after turning down a kick at the posts was extremely disappointing.
Beirne flinging a ball 20 metres backwards into our 22 past everyone for Crowley to go back, gather and clear into touch without realising it would mean the ball would be brought back to where he kicked it from and conceded 30 metres of territory for no reason.
Lowe's two mistakes, trying to keep the ball in play with nobody near him (Kolbe was as usual chasing it like his life depended on it to his credit), and trying to play a ball that was heading for the dead ball line from a drop-off.
I don't blame Kelleher at all for back-heeling the ball in the ruck, but it was a turning point unfortunately.
Crowley missed an easy penalty early on and two side-line conversions, when we lost by 7.
Casey cleared a caught kick-off on our own try-line to about 20 metres when he had made a 40 metre clearance earlier from the same thing.
The scrum-penalty on our try-line, though I honestly don't know what went wrong, maybe there was something the ref missed.
The scrum-penalty previous to that, where Kelleher popped up, but I don't know how that came about either.
There were a few knock-ons and there was a lost lineout in their 22 I think Steph du Toit read it and stole it at the front before our jumper got up.

I hope we can be more clinical the next day, the team worked hard, so just a pity for them that they weren't able to convert more opportunities.

Not seeing any evidence to support this claim Baird's form dropped off. Folks keep saying it like just speaking it will make it so. He was running the lineout for Leinster successfully. He's shown up with his carrying and defensive play. He's comfortable outplayed POM this season.