Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

There's absolutely a conversation to be had about that in a general (see Henderson, Iain) however, in this instance, the player people seem to think should be phased out before the next World Cup is still among the best in his position in the Northern Hemisphere.

How do you know this isn't the plan with Gleeson?

As I've said, Coombes should be more concerned about Gleeson than he should about who's in front of him.

It's the job of the coach to ensure that the squad is viable next year as well as next week. Sure, players need to make their case and the coaches don't seem to think Coombes has done enough, and he's not as good as Conan from what I've seen of but if Conan were to retire next year or the following year the coaches can't find themselves in a situation where there is no-one to replace him. It might seem academic but this coach actually created a situation for himself where he didn't have a viable substitute for a 37 year old Sexton. You can blame the players for not taking the jersey off him but I'm looking a the coach in that situation.

Possibly not, but is there not also a valid question as to whether Coombes will even be Munster's best option in 2 years time?

And there’s also a scenario where Coombes may not be Munster’s best option in 2 years time but is still a useful player for Ireland.

Now do the 6N failure.

Are ya trying to wind me up? An alternative 8 so Doris can move to 7? I've pretty much derailed this thread naming a certain number 8 who fits the bill 🤣

We keep failing at WCs due to over reliance on certain players. We end up flogging the same guys in the group stages, they invariably get injured and then in the QFs we have to parachute guys in who've had very little game time with the national squad. Or like in the last WC we flog Sexton and leave him on the pitch to the dying end even though he's crippled and can hardly move. Why? Because we put no minutes into Jack Crowley prior to that game when we had chances to against weaker opposition.

What are we going to learn by playing Doris at 8 and Conan in the 20 shirt vs. Japan at the weekend? How will that help us build squad depth?

We keep doing the same thing over and over in each WC cycle and yet we expect different results.

Right now Farrell is probably not looking further ahead than a few months building for the 6 nations, coaches who are ex-players also have in their dna a next game mentality. This short-sighted view will cause us to fail again at the next WC as well as the the reasons you out-lined already. It seems strange that the international player management is managed very carefully at provincial level but that goes out the window during the WC where opportunities to rest players in certain games is ignored.

It wasn’t a “noticeable drop off”…it was ONE game and his first game in 3 months, even then It wasn’t that bad a performance, still around a 7/10.

The player I mentioned in my comment you replied to that would fit the bill of being over 35.

On many occasions yes, but using as an excuse every time an older player has a poor performance is just tiresome now…