Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Farrell has been building a squad since he took over tbf. Now is the right time to bed in his systems.

I'm one of the new cap brigade! Mea culpa! I just don't think we are developing enough quality.

Realistically, for the world cup you would need a base of around 40 players. You would not want the fall off from 1st choice to back up being large?

I think this upcoming match is a serious event for Murray. A bad performance and he will be in a tough situation. I don't doubt that Casey is rarin to go. Murray imo, is under pressure.

What does this even mean? You can cap loads of guys, but either the quality is there or it isn't.

Who should have been capped that hasn't been?

Capping loads of new guys every window for the sake of it, isn't an effective way to build a squad. I think the majority of uncapped players that Farrell sees as part of his World Cup squad, have already been capped. Ideally, we'll see less and less new caps as we get closer to the RWC, as the squad will start to take shape.

• Kelleher (23)
• Sheehan (23)
• O'Toole (23)
• Baird (22)
• Coombes (24)
• Doris (23)
• Casey (22)
• H.Byrne (22)
• Hume (23)
• Baloucoune (24)

All young players who Farrell has introduced to test rugby. Plus Osborne (20) and Ahern (21) in camp as development players. I honestly don't know what some people want.

How people look at that and say he doesn't have an eye on the world cup amazes me

The metric of "new caps" dictating one's approval of a team really irritates me.

Take Harry Byrne for example. He had a 20 minute cameo against the USA in the summer. But people don't get excited about him being there because technically he isn't a "new cap".

Likewise Casey, who's only had a couple of cameos against Italy and Japan and a start v USA. But he doesn't excite people because he's not a "new cap"

Dan Sheehan is another one. He's been capped so he doesn't excite people.

Imagine H.Byrne didn't come on v the USA in the summer and Sheehan didn't come on against Japan.

It would make virtually no difference, but it would read as 2 new caps rather than 0 and people would approve, even though it makes very little difference.

People need to pay less attention to whether a player is capped or not and more on his age profile and minutes.

Baloucoune, Sheehan, O'Toole, Casey and H. Byrne are 5 players everyone should be buzzing to see play and they all have 3 caps or fewer. But they don't excite certain people because they aren't "new caps". It's strange.

Yeah, and Earls’ versatility and experience is worth a lot coming into the 6N, it makes sense that he gets game with Lowe, Keenan, Ringrose, etc.

someone earlier pointed out the new cap pathway to starting against top sides. 1 or 2 games against the likes of the USA then a 6 nations game. There’s still a lot of game time before the World Cup and the players who’ve made the grade with Farrell have done it fairly rapidly. It’s also a lot easier if the team is playing a good system very well, which might be happening.

But he's playing Baloucoune, Sheehan, O'Toole, Casey and H.Byrne? What's that if not building depth?

That's 5 very young, very inexperienced players against a tier 1 nation. How many do you want? He can't play all the kids. Add to that Kelleher and Doris (both 23) who have become 1st choice players this November.

He plays young player X, and you say you want young player Y. He can't win.

He also has to implement a style of play, which is requires a certain amount of continuity.

We've had two games where we're starting to look slick and fluid in our new style. So we'd be getting way ahead of ourselves if we thought we we're in a position to make wholesale changes and still be cohesive.

It's really important that we keep improving and building momentum with the 6N around the corner.

It was mentioned above that all we have to do is look at the squad from the start of the year to see the progress that has been made.

The front row has gone from Healy, Herring, Furlong to Porter, Kelleher, Furlong. Sheehan is making a real play for that 16 shirt too.

Beirne had been moving back and forth between lock and blindside. He’s now nailed down lock as his position.

Our back row was POM, Connors, Stander. Now it’s Doris, VDF, Conan.

Murray was our first choice scrum half. He’s been dropped in favour of JGP.

Burns was our second choice 10 (albeit with Carbery injured). With Carbery back he’s taken that slot, but instead of having Burns as 3rd choice we now have Harry Byrne there.

Earls was our starting right wing. He’s been overtaken by Conway and possibly even Balacoune now. And while Lowe was starting on the wing, he has since been dropped and brought back in again.

We’ve seen 7 changes to our starting XV alone this year as well as Lowes exclusion and return to the squad.

Add to this the change in game plan plus the fact that we know that Farrell isn’t shy about giving players debuts in 6Ns games that aren’t against Italy (players like Kelleher, Doris and Keenan can attest to that) then we can clearly see that if guys are good enough they will get games. And not just games against the US. We seem to be evolving our side quite well and we don’t really need those games where we blind loads of young lads in one go because we’re blooding them as we go along.

I think Addison or Stockdale might have been 23 ahead of Earls had either of them been fit.

I would have preferred Larmour on the bench, experienced enough plus still has plenty of room to grow.

Jack Kelly? Is that the u20 captain from 2017?

Wolfhound games in the past have always been a disappointment despite some tasty line ups. You’re generally just throwing 15 players together who aren’t completely on the same page. The focus is always the first 15. Any decent moves will be kept under wraps etc

I remember buzzing to watch this one a few years ago. Wasn’t too good.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/31045244

Personally I hope not. I think the A teams have had their day.

That said the current gap between URC Rd 5 and Rd 6 is far too long and needs filled with something.

A games tend to be very poor matches and not a step up from league games. The only real benefit is game time. Extremely difficult to play well and standout in a thrown together team.

The A games were rarely great. They were normally a bunch of guys who were just thrown together. I honestly think the young lads would get more from playing a Champions Cup match or big URC play off or Inter Pro.