Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Negative short term might be positive long term.

It’s very difficult to see 37 year old Sexton getting through five weeks, hopefully even longer, of a World Cup. Carbery obviously has his own injury issues and wouldn’t like to bet too much on him doing so. Ireland need to be getting third choice and fourth choice 10s plenty of game time in the next 18 months.

I think our chances have gone from 50/50 to 75/25 against without Sexton.

Great chance for carberry. And a great chance to see how this new system with multiple playmakers functions without sexton pulling the strings.

I don't know how many Ireland starts Carbery has had in an Ireland team that is settled and playing well, not many I would wager. Let's see how he gets on this weekend, I'm optimistic about him.

15. Hugo Keenan (Leinster/UCD) 17 caps

14. Andrew Conway (Munster/Garryowen) 28 caps

13. Garry Ringrose (Leinster/UCD) 38 caps

12. Bundee Aki (Connacht/Galwegians) 34 caps

11. Mack Hansen (Connacht) 1 cap

10. Joey Carbery (Munster/Clontarf) 28 caps

9. Jamison Gibson Park (Leinster) 13 caps

1. Andrew Porter (Leinster/UCD) 41 caps

2. Ronan Kelleher (Leinster/Lansdowne) 17 caps

3. Tadhg Furlong (Leinster/Clontarf) 53 caps

4. Tadhg Beirne (Munster/Lansdowne) 26 caps

5. James Ryan (Leinster/UCD) 41 caps CAPTAIN

6. Caelan Doris (Leinster/St Mary’s College) 13 caps

7. Josh van der Flier (Leinster/UCD) 36 caps

8. Jack Conan (Leinster/Old Belvedere) 23 caps

Replacements

16. Dan Sheehan (Leinster/Lansdowne) 3 caps

17. Cian Healy (Leinster/Clontarf) 113 caps

18. Finlay Bealham (Connacht/Buccaneers) 19 caps

19. Iain Henderson (Ulster/Academy) 65 caps

20. Peter O’Mahony (Munster/Cork Constitution) 80 caps

21. Conor Murray (Munster/Garryowen) 93 caps

22. Jack Carty (Buccaneers/Connacht) 10 caps

23. Robbie Henshaw (Leinster/Buccaneers) 53 caps

Hard to believe this is Carbery’s first 6N start considering he made his debut in 2016.

Huge opportunity for him. Hopefully he can grasp it.

And this is why planning to go to the RWC relying on a 37 year old fly half to be fit is suicide. I honestly wouldnt be against giving Sexton the 2022/2023 season off with Ireland so we can focus on building depth at 10 with the RWC in mind, this idea that we can be relying on a 38 year old to be fit for 5 weeks in the sort of planning id expect from a tier 2 nation, not Ireland.

To be honest we should have been starting Carbery with or without an available Sexton for this Six Nations.

This is huge for building the team ahead of the RWC, how Joey plays this weekend could be a defining moment for the team moving forward. The end of an era and the beginning of a new one perhaps.

Much more excited for the game now!

Maybe this could be the best thing that ever happened to Ireland with the RWC in mind, if Carbery has the game of his life and he manages to guide us on to a famous win in Paris then his confidence will be sky high and then we will know for sure that we don't desperately need Sexton to win big matches, yes we are improved if Sexton plays of course but the key issue we need to fix is NEEDING Sexton to win a big game, we have so many quality players in that Irish squad that we shouldn't have to be reliant on one player to make us tick.

And one other thing I'd say about the situation at 10 is since this new style started clicking, from Japan in the autumn until now, we probably arent as reliant on Sexton as we used to be as the way we play now is much more of a 1-15 game whereas lets say under Schmidt it felt like everything had to go through Sexton as the gameplan was much more system based rather than based on the individuals in the team. Like I said previously we shouldnt be dependent on one player being fit if we want to win a RWC no matter how good that player so this may not be a bad thing.

We are planning on it because not enough has been done to fix the problem.

I don't think Joey Carbery is as good as Jonny Sexton - but that is not the problem here.

The problem is that switching Sexton in and out is not a case of changing the player. It is a case of changing the systems and re-distributing all the things he does among the rest of the backline and leadership team. The team is built around him in a way no other team is. Carbery isn't just being asked to fill in, he's being asked to fill in with three degrees of separation from his nearest provincial colleagues, to replace broken cog in a machine he wasn't built for.

The choice to replace Sexton (when it happens) has to be a commitment. It can't be a transition. This game will not be a preminition of Ireland without Sexton. Joey has the world against him, I hope he goes really well and Carty has a great one off the bench - but I won't judge him based on how it goes, and I have very low expectations.

Is anyone actually surprised sexton is injured?

Carbery's first start in the 6N, that tells its own story.

Just throwing someone to the wolves isnt "giving someone a chance". You need to actually back a 10 rather simply say hold the jersey for Sexton, its the sort of thing Ireland have done in the 2000s which is why before 2013 or so we always struggled depth wise as we didnt back enough players outside our starting team.

Carbery has the talent to be a good test level 10 but he needs confidence and with that he needs to be backed this weekend, maybe a blessing that Sexton's injury has come up in the media until today as now any preparation France had with stopping Ireland's attack is affected as we all know their plan would have been to rattle Sexton and to be fair Carbery is a very different kind of 10 so its hard to know if the same tactics will work.