Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

it might also expose the more merchanary nature of some of the project guys who have qualified on the 5 year rule 

Gibson Park actually qualified after 3 years before the rule change, and could have been selected for the 2019 RWC, iirc.

I think he was ~27 before he got an Ireland cap. He wasn’t in Farrell’s first 6 Nations squad initially, until the re-scheduled October games due to Covid.

He (and imo, Tadhg Beirne) are great examples of players who developed later in their career, who belie any talk of “ceilings”.

Yes you're correct I forgot that he was one of the final players to qualify under the 3 year rule for Ireland. His development was also slowed by the fact that Leinster couldn't select him in European competitions because of the limits on players from non-EEA non-Cotonou Agreement countries because Leinster prioritised Scott Fardy and James Lowe for European squads.

this is the point with Prendergast. He is generally hopeless against good teams. Great doing the silly stutter pass against hopeless weak teams - gets you smashed against top tier teams.

What are the "in form" tier 1 teams which either Jack Crowley or Ireland in general have played well against?

Which is 2 years ago and was against 14 men. In a year they also drew with Italy and narrowly beat Scotland and England.

My point is if you are going to judge Sam on that metric than the competition needs to be judged on the same metric.

I know you are in the Harry Byrne camp but from following Leinster he hasn't been playing better than Sam in my opinion.

Disappointed in that team to be honest. Heaven help the scrum.

Cant see what Tommy o brien adds. Not at this level.

Glad we went 5/3, I assume Frawley is there to cover 15 as they'll not want to move Jack in case Osborne gets a knock or has to move to centre.

Very tough on Izuchukwu to miss out completely.

Beirne essentially providing the 2nd row cover, but I'm not sure I love having 2 back-rows on the bench. (Hope Edogbo is back in for the Wales game).

Not sure I love that starting back-row either, I think all 3 of them need a big performance and big improvement from recent games. (Jack Conan unlucky not to start and Izzy unlucky to miss out).

Ringrose, Sheehan and Joe McCarthy as well in need of big games here (think Lawrence back for England is a huge plus for them, Ringrose can't afford to be shooting and missing tackles).

You'd imagine Crowley will do the majority of the 80 mins at 10 here, and I think he deserves it. Hopefully will carry on a lot of the good we saw from him last week, and cut out the bad.

Sexton's comments the other day about 4 10's in retrospect look like the big indication around Frawley here. I don't love it, but I get it with a view towards a RWC panel, and I think a little time out of the spotlight will do Prendergast some good.

Baloucoune deserving of his start as well, quality performance and brilliant finish that I don't think many other wingers in the squad could have pulled off. (Maybe turning the corner after his supposed "career or mediocrity" as previously suggested on here...).

We can only hope scrum - and Loughman - go much better this time round.

very disappointed in the bench. I had hoped our experiment with no 2nd rows are the bench would have finished with the SA game in November.

Then 5-3 is almost a retro look in rugby, would have much preferred to seen Edogbo in for TOB.

TOB looks to me to be the next Fergus McFadden, very good at club level because of his commitment and general footballing ability but lacking the last 10% to be a 50 cap international. Hopefully he proves me wrong.

Prendergast isn't as rubbish as is being made out by some.

But he also has been dropped for a reason, which includes some of the completely valid criticisms of others.

As always, the truth lies somewhere in the middle.

But conflating the two - which has been happening a lot on here of late - is a mistake.