Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

is Wilson injured? He’s not even in the A squad.

From the bits I’ve seen of him he looks more promising than Clarkson, Aungier and Jager. The T O’Toole loosehead experiment looks to be continuing for the A’s.

Just reviewing the squad selection and although I'm very happy with the 23 picked it does give an interesting insight into the current state of Irish Rugby.

Of the 15 starters, 12 Leinster, 2 Munster & 1 Connacht.

The 8 subs, 4 Leinster, 3 Connacht & 2 Munster.

Total breakdown of the matchday 23: 15 Leinster (65%), 4 Connacht (17%) and 4 Munster (17%). Zero Ulster players selected.

I'm not for a second suggesting that the players selected don't deserve their spot. What is alarming is how far behind Leinster the other 3 provinces have fallen. It must be a very tough time to be an Ulster fan in particular. Granted Izuchukwu may have been benching if he wasn't injured.

What's worse is that 1 of the Munster players is a product of the Leinster academy and schools system (Beirne). And 2 of the other 3 are probably playing in their final season at international level (POM & Murray). Crowley is the only homegrown player who'll be there long term.

1 of the Connacht players is in the same boat being a Leinster product (C Prendergast). The other 3 Connacht representatives comprise of two who play for Ireland based on familial relations (Bealham and Hansen) and the other qualified due to residency (Aki).

Hard to see how this will play out long term. It's great in the short term, Leinster and Ireland have a great crop of players and if the Leinster school production line keeps pumping them out then perhaps the national team remains strong. But surely interest in rugby in the other 4 provinces will suffer badly from this.

And before the inevitable jumping down my throat for making such a point I'd like to point out that I happen to hold the juxtaposed opinions that the current success of the national team is unprecedented and wonderful while also holding the opinion that long term the prospects of the three non-Leinster provinces looks to be fcuked.

Because he's a poor scrummager.

Clarkson Has been good. Core stuff at set piece he has been solid. He is not far off 50 leinster appearances and I'd wager he will endup with 200+ leinster appearances and 50+ international caps if he is lucky on the injury front.

He is getting more and more prominent around the park too.

i wouldnt be so dismissive of it, whether you agree with the sentiment or not its definitely a bit more prevalent that just 2 or 3 on here

Right, I remember not being able to win a game in France or London from one end of a decade to another. Henshaw has never won a test in Cardiff and Wales are shite! Wales are probably worse than they ever been yet they have 4 grand slams in the last 20 years, that tells you how quickly things can turn around. Anyone not enjoying Ireland's purple patch for some kind of parochial reason has got serious problems unrelated to sport.

They are devoid of any ideas or game plan...look at the france game.

The recognised 10 is way off form, yes they have a few players but ultimately too many that are not test level standard.

Gatland departure & hurt won't get them far when they are that far off game plans & set plays.

References in other posts to 4 slams in 2O yrs is not relevant as that team are all gone & what came behind them are shadows

Go back to the GS games in 09

V wales Heaslip, Bod, Darcy , Fitz and Kearney were the Leinster representation In the 22. Munster had 11 players.

It's 15 Leinster versus 4 Munster on Saturday so it's not the same but it's not too far off it. And if you go by population the numbers actually reflect roughly pro rata by that metric.

Some Munster fans seem irked by Gavin Coombes omission but I don't see why. Doris is a world class operator, Conan is a better player than Coombes. So we rotate this week and put Coombes in for one game. That achieves very little in the grand scheme of things because Doris is not going to be left out when fit.

The current Domination of the 23 by Leinster players is by and large down to other provinces not producing players of that calibre. Munster have been producing players lately, very good in URC, good in Europe but that'd where the problem lies. European form, a big step up above URC is a telling factor here.

i usually go out to the pub watch6N matches and meetup with my dad and brothers, and now my Adult sons . None of us have any real interest in doing so this year . It’s a tradition every year that we cherish as my Da is getting on in years and his health isn’t the best lately

I went out to watch the Scotland match in my local in limerick and the owner switched two of the three TV’s over to the hurling at half time , and there wasn’t any objections in the bar.

Speaking to others around limerick in the past few weeks, the disenchantment with the Irish rugby team and #teamofus is very real. The reason why, rightly or wrongly are plain to see.

Go to the rugby pubs on saturday in Limerick and you will have busy bar during the game but also notice a fair amount of detachment in the build up and particularly after the game.

Ive never seen such a focus on the relevance as to what province you play for or where you were born as being meaningful when supporting the Irish rugby team. The waft of arrogance isn’t what we Irish were about . The OTB piece and daily Indo clickbait only reinforce the view.

I will be going out to the pub to support ireland on saturday hope we beat the welsh, who are in a dark place that anyone following the Irish rugby team longer than the last 10 years knows only too well.

But that detachment comes from within. When Munster fielded a team in the not too distant past with multiple south african/kiwis etc and a few other imports from leinster did Munster fans have the same detachment from the team ??

In November just gone Munster fielded a team with 5 of the 7 starting backs were signings. Do Munster fans feel a detachment from that team??

It's very selective detachment IMO.

How many times have you seen four Connacht in an Irish squad?

You can talk about Ulster and Munster all you want but Connacht has improved and have more players in contention than ever before. And it's not just the ones that are there now, we have players coming through. There's a few others there who are being considered, we have six in the A squad.

We have a very talented 21year old who plays 13. He's not in the Ireland picture yet but he will be very soon.

we were absolutely not happy about alot of that though

Surely that says a lot more about the type of “fans” there are in Limerick than it does about the team or the IRFU?

Obviously hurling has never been as strong in Limerick as it currently is and it’s only natural that has taken over somewhat but I would suspect a lot of the people telling you about their disenchantment were only the sunshine supporters in the first place and as soon as it’s not to their liking they turn to something different.

If hurling in Limerick goes downhill in a few years time what will the switch to then?

Which precisely?