Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

40-42 would be a massive squad to take for 5 games. Bigger than Gatland's Lions squads and getting towards Woodward's infamous two matchday 22s.

I'd like to see Wycherley and one or maybe even both of Dooley and Loughman taken as backup to Porter rather than including Healy and Kilcoyne.

Loose head and ten definitely look the two spots needing be most looking at, tighthead not too far behind as a third choice hasn’t really put they’re hand up. Moore could be a bolter there.

The more I’ve thought about it the more I think James Ryan shouldn’t be rushed back for this tour. Write his season off now and let him come back for preseason fresh and recharged. The potential break could be brilliant for him given the nature of his rise to first choice.

Dooley can’t by Ed Byrne, he will get very little game time for Leinster as fourth choice LH after the 6N unless it thru injuries.

He wasn’t going to leap frog him anyway, now with him moving on he certainly won’t. He’ll pick up a bit of time alright but it won’t be significant unless he’s needed. Jack Boyle may well pick up a bit of time too.

While it was a pretty good 6N, I don't think we quite hit the heights we did in November in terms of performance (bar maybe the Wales game). The Japan and NZ performances were two of the best Irish performances I've ever seen. The challenge for the coaching staff, is to have us playing to that level again at the world cup, so that we can deliver a performance like we did against NZ, in the quarter final against NZ or France.

It's something that Eddie Jones, for all the criticism he gets (a lot of which is warranted) is exceptional at. In 2019, he had his team playing at the absolute peak of their performance at exactly the right time.

I singled out NZ and France because it will be one of them we face in the quarters.

We always bring out a big performance in the group stage. Australia in 2011, France in 2015, Scotland in 2019. But when it gets to the knockouts we invariably crumble because we've treated a group game like a world cup final.

We need to save our big performance for the quarter final this time, that means not over-expending ourselves physically and emotionally in the group stage. I hear people talking about the pool game v SA as this massive game, when in reality it isn't. As long as we beat Scotland we'll get out of the group. The SA game isn't that important. What's the point in draining ourselves to beat SA, if we just get pumped by 50 points in the quarters? I'd much rather come 2nd in the group and give it a real craic in the quarters, than win the group but have nothing left to give thereafter.

Exactly. People seem to love boiling our RWC failures down to being a singular thing. They haven’t been.

2007 - Coaching team messed up our prep and didn’t focus on the rugby side of it enough.

2011 - Coaches messed up selection for the QF, an issue that wasn’t limited to the RWC and continued on for some time after that too. I don’t think Kidney was able to adapt to changes in the game quickly enough and ended up uncertain of which way he wanted Ireland to go.

2015 - pretty much the entire spine of our team was gone through injury or suspension for grievous bodily harm leaving the victim unable to sleep at night (I will never forget that utterly BS “victim statement”!).

2019 - this was the first year where we arguably bottled it. I think (and this is possibly total garbage) the entire set up took their eye off the ball going into the 6Ns with the RWC being the prize (selecting Henshaw at FB vs England wasn’t a selection for that day IMO). This impacted performances in the 6Ns. And once performances started to slip I think a collective panic set in the closer we got to the RWC. We’ve heard about how the coaches started getting involved at times they wouldn’t have previously etc.

I don’t think there has been a single year where we failed at a RWC because we put everything into a pool game and treated that game as a final.

I'd agree it's been a mental issue more than anything. A consistent failure to match intensity levels. There was little difference between the NZ we played in the 1/4s than the one we beat the previous year, yet our performance was so far below how we played then. Likewise Wales in 2011, or France in 2003.

This year's 6ns gives me some hope that we might finally be past this issue. The tour to NZ is massive imo, for that reason. We have to maintain our performance level down there.

No and I never said that.

Whatever about the poor selections (which I agree with you on), we were not on the same level as Wales emotionally that day. Fact.

It was 150% a factor. I never said it was "the" reason, but it was absolutely "a" reason and you can't just dismiss it and say "nah it was all on Kidney", even if much of it was.

Had we taken it easier against France we might have had more in the tank and not had guys injured!? What!? We had guys injured because France were gunning for us physically and because we got a bit unlucky (POCs injury). Us taking it easier in that game wouldn’t have led to France taking it any easier on us. They specifically went out there to beat us up. They talked about it beforehand. Us taking it easier might have actually led to more guys getting injured, not less. And may have led to us losing the game too.

Also, saying we expend ourselves in a game leaving ourselves unable to get up for another isn’t exactly an objective analysis of events. It’s entirely emotive and almost impossible to measure. Saying we selected the wrong half backs and played into the opposition hands is an objective analysis and not in anyway the same as the former.

Also how do you gauge the level teams are on emotionally from the comfort of your couch exactly? To the point you can deem your analysis as fact, in bold no less? That stuff is so incredibly personal and individual I’ve no idea how it’s measurable or observable by complete strangers seeing less than all they need to make that assessment.