Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

He should have been given more games, this retirement has been way over the top, it's professional sport Healy should have been moved on after the November Internationals.

Forget about the number 10 debate. Ireland have serious problems re coaching. We look clueless in attack. So slow. So easy to read. Defence has also been abject at times.

It’s depressing to see how organised England are after making positional switches and to compare how disjointed and flustered Ireland wee against Italy. More or less with a first choice team.

That performance raised serious questions about what exactly Ireland have been trying to develop and do through the 6 nations.

Scoring just 2 tries against this diabolical Wales team sums up our attack. Goodman has destroyed our attack.

Why do you think he didn’t get a chance?

In the last six months, we’ve seen a guy come from miles back and overtake three internationally capped 10s to become first choice at Leinster. Some guys don’t need to be “given a chance”, they just demand selection.

The cruel reality is that Frawley seems to have all the tools - strength, speed, kicking, passing - but has never been able to put it all together. No one is to blame for that. It just is the way it is.

What do you mean 'should have been going for'? When?

They aren't going to bring these people in when the head coach is away (I detest the Lions in the modern era)

It's hard to know what to think about the performance of Ireland this yeay. In most years, 4 wins is a great achievement, but that usually means we beat one of the big two away from home. This year it seems disappointing, maybe because we never really looked comfortable during most of our wins. There are always fine margins but it seems like we didn't win many of them.

We gave away stupid tries against England and it will likely cost us a place in the table. But if Finn R took the conversion from the right place, England would be worse than us. France catching a few balls against England and they had the GS, and we wonder about England potentially having 3 defeats. But now they could win. Is it just that the three or four top teams (including Scotland against England here) are just more competitive and so we will see more close competitions or something else?

Either way I think we need to look at the coaching ticket and what depth there is in the absence of Farrell

It can’t be just the one coach!
I believe Farrell is also the one who is responsible for the phase play attack.
You will also see allot of posts trying to railroad the conversation to Prendergast v Crowley.
I think it’s pretty clear this team have just got old. The edge is blunt.

Absolutely. All the tin foil hat Munster fans should look at his performance against the second worst team in the 6N and reflect on how bad he was today. He did nothing and offered nothing. They said SP was poor from the tee - well he was certainly not as bad as JC today - awful. 3/10

I was thinking the new English guy Fin Smith would be surely up there?- Finn Russell quite poor this year but maybe experience counts for a lot?🤔

He has 16 starts at 10 at 27. He may or may not ever have been good enough but averaging 2 games a year in his favoured position was never going to develop him. At least now we are identifying players earlier to gain experience in such a pivotal position. Last years 6 nations for Crowley and this years for Prendergast will stand to them. We still though seem to have to force the provinces hand to put through talented younger over barely competent journeymen though. Quite often selection for the national squad is what cements a players place in their provincial lineup. JGP being a prime example.