Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

i would have liked to see Prendergast make it, only prob is I couldn’t see who I’d leave out, maybe McCloskey but I like him too. It’s a great squad very difficult to argue against anyone who made it. Big shame for Cian Healy probably my favourite Irish player ever, if it’s possible to get back to fitness I wouldn’t bet against him making a late stage reappearance. I still think we have a very tough route to succeed past the quarters and as disappointing as that might be I can’t fault the prep and personnel we’ve used in the run up to this W.C. Good luck lads and let’s enjoy it.

5 to10 weeks, calf tear possibly

More or less the team we picked at the start of this thread bar Healy. I just don't think we have enough cover in different positions in the backs to go with 19 fowards ... too soon for Frawley and earls and o'brien are a bit undersized for centre ..add a brittle out half to that.

Sadly I think we are another cycle away to truely having the depth compared to bigger nations but we are getting there.

But c'mon Ireland

18-15 a mistake hope if a back get injured a forward will be called later

It’s not that he can’t, it’s that he didn’t, when any 10 with a brain would have. If you haven’t got the ability to grasp that, I would suggest you do leave it there. I’ll leave you to your delusion that he’s a genius.

Its a mistake, in your opinion.

That doesn't mean Farrell and his Coaches are mistaken. They have months and gigabytes of data and observation. They have the playbooks.

If they come a cropper for it in some way during the tournament, then we can say it was a mistake, but not now, not looking on from the ditch.

In any case, its really not that important of a call. Injury means a replacement from the extended squad, just 90 minutes away. And if tactics require it, an injury can be manufactured to call someone in from the extended 50 submitted to World Rugby earlier. Only draw back is, that player may not return.

Honestly, I'd say at least 18 other Countries wish they had our problems.

Squad is as expected really. Gutted for the two Cian’s but got different reasons.

Slightly concerned about Sexton, Sheehan, Kelleher, Conan and JOB’s level of fitness considering the lack of minutes they’ve had over the warm ups. Hopefully the schedule is as nice as it looks on paper.

Shura why shud we go! We're shyte.

Not even close. Possibly just behind Fickou!

Gutted for Church. What a shame. He just picks up injuries at the wrong time. I've no problem with Loughman getting called up. He'll play v Romania 🇷🇴. He can probably do a job as a finisher.

Surprised that Baird only has that few caps! I thought he was mid 20's!

Spain are better than Romania, who only qualified cause of some technicality - Spain were thumped by 60 points by the Pumas last night - really will be a run out for many.

I wouldnt be sure about that. It will depend when a replacement is called. The versatility Prendergast brings is valuable in the Group stages. It becomes less valuable as the tournament moves on. I think if we had to call someone up in the quarters, you would then be looking at who is the best like for like swap. If Conan got injured against Scotland, I would be surprised if it wasnt Coombes that was called up.

My comment does not go remotely near implying that FFS - I happen to think that the match against Scotland is a far harder proposition than many on here think - it would be good to have a sensible discussion on that but it seems that is not possible on this 'discussion' board.

Darcy Graham, who according to Andrew Mehrtens recently would walk into any World XV at the moment, was injured for the 6N match - is he not a potential major threat?

Surely that represents an immediate narrowing of the gap, unless you think he's also 'flaky'/ can't defend etc etc