Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Coombes will definitely be named today.

I think Hodnett could well miss out and that will be the one that upsets people.

How so? We should win this world cup, we've beaten everyone. New Zealand away, the grand slam, we've gone into world cups with expectations before and flopped, not this time. We're going to win the World Cup . We shouldn't accept anything less and the good thing is that the players/management won't either. No more chokes!

Not winning the world cup is not a choke.

A choke would be losing to both Scotland and SA and not getting out of the group.

A QF against either NZ or France is basically a 50/50 call. France being the more difficult match on their home turf. But beating the All-Blacks is never easy and shouldn't be taken for granted.

I guess you missed his block down that led to the try which won the match. Do you follow rugby?

I would just ignore that poster, and certainly stop quoting him.

The 46 players that were in camp (37 initial squad plus 9 called up) will surely be largely the 45.

The two players I think could miss out due to shortage of playing time would probably be Scott Penny and either Carbery or Frawley.

I could also see Timoney losing out to Hodnett.

On current form Shane Daly has to be in there as well, I don't know whether that would mean dropping Larmour or Earls.

There's a case for Kleyn over Treadwell also.

Archer is playing better than Salanoa also.

I'd have Loughman ahead of Kilcoyne and Milne too.

I thought Coombes was one of the few Munster players who probably didn't advance his cause much on Saturday. Didn't think he had much impact at all. Guys like Loughman, Kleyn, Hodnett, Crowley, Nash, Daly and Haley probably gave Farrell and co more food for thought. But I don't think their mind will have been changed much re: Coombes.

When you write it down like that there really isn't a huge amount to debate..

Does Baird go as a second row? If he goes as a backrow then maybe Treadwell/Kleyn go instead of Prendergast

Do they bring 4 specialist centers?

Who goes as the final back 3 player? i.e. Nash/Stockdale/Larmour/etc. etc.

And really none of these decisions will make or break our World Cup

We've got out of our group before and choked. It has been a regular occurrence in quarter finals. We don't want a repeat this time so the mental game is something that Farrell can't ignore. Obviously losing a close game to New Zealand or France may not be a bottle job but we're the best team in the World. The players will see anything less than winning the World Cup as failure and we should too.

Losing to Wales or Argentina can be seen as choking. Losing to the All Blacks or the French on their home patch can not.

That said, I truly hope Farrell doesn't follow the same tired path of picking established names regardless of form. Picking guys like Kilcoyne, Salanoa, Treadwell, Prendergast, Timoney and Larmour ahead of lads in their positions who are showing far greater form would be a worrying first step on the campaign.

It depends on the manner of the defeat but I agree, it's important to pick form players and change things up if needed.

Deegan and Prendergast score significantly fewer tries than Coombes

Using the very blunt instrument of Tries per minutes played in their career,

Coombes 1 try per 126 mins (and this is wiith him playing significant amounts of minutes this year in the 2nd row, the position least likely to score tries)

Deegan 1 try per 164 mins

Prendergast 1 try every 609 minutes

Penny plays a different role to Coombes, They're not in competition with each other for a spot