Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

So I am just looking at basic statistics and the ages of players in the squads. Now the SA squad is for the Rugby Championship as they have not selected the squad for the end of year tour yet and the Irish, New Zealand and Australia squads are for the end of year tour.

Players over 30 -

Ireland 14 - players over 34 at RWC 11

New Zealand 8 - players over 34 at RWC 4

Australia 6 - players over 34 at RWC 1

South Africa 21 - players over 34 at RWC 11

If you looked at the age profile of the squads at the previous RWC you would have seen problems for Ireland and in particular South Africa and this is borne out by the numbers above. I don't think it is debilitating for either, but both have ageing squads that may come back to bite them in a tight match.

Who cares, as the end results will justify the means. NZ or France win the RWC, proof the other squads were too old. SA win again, proof experience is the key. Ireland make the semi or final, it all worked out and if they are knocked out again at the QF, then proof it was a dismal failure.

sad in a way that JS missed his last ever kick at goal too.

earlier in his career he had missed a few very gettable kicks at important times (v NZ 2013, v France 2014) but it was seemingly something he had got over, just very unfortunate all round that it came back at the worst time - could easily have been a fatigue thing at that point of the match too

Or, our attack might have spluttered and stumbled after 3 phases instead of the 32+ phases we went through in going up the field.

My standout memory of that last attack was Tadgh Beirne getting a ball and collapsing to the ground immediately. There was nothing left in the tank.

Had he not needlessly played against Romania and Tonga he might have had a bit more in the tank. The squad management at the World Cup was shocking and one of the key reasons we failed at the quarters once again. Management didn't come under anywhere near enough scrutiny for that.

i suppose the ban combined with his injuries meaning JS barely played in months lead to him playing in pool games that he normally wouldnt have been likely to.

but either way i would have thought that a 38 year old is unlikely to make it through a full game of that high an intensity and there should have been a plan for that

again, its all ifs and buts

He played 105 mins combined against Romania and Tonga, and the Tonga game was a full month before we played NZ.

Beirne played 80 against Tonga, 80 against Romania, 80 against South Africa and 50 against Scotland. He also played 190 minutes in the warm up games. I think it's fair to say that maybe he might not have been out on his feet in the quarter final had his workload been managed that bit better. Those numbers are absolutely ridiculous and its very difficult to justify needing him against the likes of Tonga and Romania for 80 minutes, let alone playing nearly 80% of the available minutes in the warmups.

Except, there was a bang in form, young 10 on the bench all raring to go who was a proven winner too!? This young 10 had closed out some really tight, high quality matches to seal a fantastic URC win, with a 6 match unbeaten closing run, only 5 months before also, so he was a proven closer e.g. recall the drop goal v Leinster to seal the semi final win away from home for instance...

The fact that AF seemingly had more confidence in a 38 year old, semi crocked, fatigued former great, says much more about AF's 'stuck in the mud' selection mindset than Jack Crowley imho. All we know for certain is that it would have been a different last 15 minutes had AF put Jack Crowley on the pitch, which he should have of course imho. I'm not saying Ireland would have definitely scored, but they'd definitely have been much more likely to score than trying to persevere with a visibly exhausted Sexton, simply shipping ball on, as he was clearly gassed & out of ideas.

P.s. Jack Crowley then went on to illustrate the idiocy of not using him more versus the ABs in that losing RWC QF, when he seamlessly took over from Sexton to win the 6Ns with that same Irish side, only 3 months later. This included a great away win v France first up, as well as good wins versus all the other sides bar a very narrow loss to an excellent (RWC runners up) England team away in Twickenham.

In short, AF fupped up by not using Crowley & more of his squad more actively imho, and by not rotating & resting the older players in his squad at the RWC.

P.s. The D4 rugby mejia have given him a total free pass on this also, despite even Rassie Erasmus highlighting the folly of this approach for them, which is frankly bewildering imho.....

Interesting perspective from Brian O’Driscoll on the 10 debate which simplifies and clarifies the issue. Crowley a very formidable strong defender with much less agility or innovation on the front foot. Sam fully armed in driving the attack with a wide array of weapons, and then much weaker in defence. So neither the complete article and the perfect 10 if combined. You can debate which is easier to learn, but confidence the key to unlocking an improvement in both.

It’s a shocking indictment of Farrell that he’s been in the job for six years and hasn’t even attempted to splice their DNA.

I’m not sure what Drico means by ‘agility’ as I’d have Crowley down as the better athlete with the better step, for example.

And there might be something to this. But the point I’ve made before is that Crowley is an awful lot closer to Prendergast's attacking game than Prendergast is to Crowley's defence. Unless he improves significantly, imo any upsides won't outweigh the downsides.