Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

JGP is always going to remain on the pitch with a close game. And that’s the right decision as he is so far ahead and can pull rabbits out of the hat at key times. If Andy pulled him off and Ireland lost he’s get lambasted why take the risk to take off your best player?

On my viewing of the game, Crowley kept the ball in play moving much faster than Sam Prendergast did in his recent run of games and it was just Wales being more prepared for a fight that meant a lot of the attack (that maybe should have been varied a bit more) did not make as much progress as I would have liked to see.

Crowley scored a well taken try and was instrumental in other players scoring tries and while he should have converted some not very difficult (for this level of rugby) kicks I think his all round play makes up for these shortfalls in expectations. His over all play still makes him the best option in that position to keep the Irish back line working well.

The frustrating thing in my mind is that his kicking was more reliable and whatever is going on in the background this season seems to be making his kicks less reliable than in previous seasons. If it is the influence of Sexton's coaching then maybe it is just a transitional effect and hopefully Crowley's kicking gets back to matching his all round play.

Using a bonus point win to take sniping comments about the number ten position seems a bit nonsensical to me.

Stockdale is good going forward

But he's a lazy git running back to cover and I don't trust his tackling or decision making in defensive situations

Stockdale played well last night. Good try, nice pop to Osborne for his try, and a couple of other threatening moments, plus he seemed sound to me. It was a decent night for him.

I'll give Dickson some credit here, it's a law in the game thats sadly not refereed and it was good to see it penalised. It would sort a lot of the scrum mess out in the game if the hookers were forced to hook and the props forced to prop them up while doing so.

I reckon we need a new kicking coach - what works for sexton doesn't work for others… both Crowley and sam have suffered, I reckon.

Captaincy needs to be looked at. Doris clearly annoyed Dickson at times last night.

Looking at the performances against France, Italy and now Wales, the English result just points to England being a bit crap on the day.

Doak looked good on his first performance, also compare Stockdale's disinterested jog back when Crowley was clearly going to be isolated to McCloskey busting a gut to catch Smith.  

Reservation would be that with a very solid and experienced 7, 8, 9, 10, 12 & 13 we dealt poorly enough with Wales directness and accuracy in defense. I'd like to have seen more tactical invention from that group.

Agree totally, totally over reaction from fans that don't really understand the game, think a big plus from yesterday was Nathan Doaks debut, he looks like the definit number two for the future.