Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

Younger players need to get an early introduction to the international level. I'm not saying any particular player needs to be in the squad on a regular basis.

Introducing them to that level earlier gives them an experience of what they need to work towards. It benefits the team in the medium term.

We need a panel largely made up of players under 30 now, with plenty of games under their belt for 2027. Now is the time to start their introduction.

Herring, Bealham, Kilcoyne, POM, Bundee, Murray and obviously Johnny won't be there. Maybe one might still be there.

We won't have all, if any, of Beirne, Henderson, Conan, Josh, Henshaw, McCloskey and Lowe and Gibson-Park.

That's 15 players from our World Cup squad. If we have three of them at the next World Cup I'll be surprised.

So what do you want to do? Start introducing them two years in advance? Will you find the right players and give them enough experience by the time 2027 rolls around?

I think you need to give them time now and have most of your starters set two years in advance of the next World Cup.

A decision was clearly taken(to me anyway) post 2019 to move away from POM. He seemed to have moved into the backup/experience off the bench role. Potentially the captain against the tier 2 teams etc. Media talk as well but that was the way it looked.

Yet he manage to fight his way back into been one of the most critical players for Ireland come World Cup. So players clearly had the ability to fight to get into the team

See below in terms of transition over the period.

This was the first Farrell squad post Joe. You had 18 players who didn't travel to World Cup in that squad I think at a quick glance. Including 5 players uncapped. Seems to me a decent number of players swapped in/out over that period.

I think all of the 3 you mentioned played at their provinces from 2020

The panel we had failed. They weren't good enough. That's the reality! It was our best opportunity too, imo.

There will be a phased period to additions and subtraction. In my opinion, scrum half is a key position to blood somebody. Murray should be phased out. Gibson Park didn't have a good world cup and I doubt he's around in 4 years. Hopefully a new scrum half is in the 6nations squad. Loose head I think will be Porter and Loughman with another. Pointless continuing with Kilcoyne and Healy.

A province badly needs to get across the line in Europe, imo. I'm no psychologist, and not to downplay the achievement of a Grand Slam, but it really does seem as though the mental pressure created by "we need to win to stay undefeated" is very different to the pressure created by "we need to win or we go home with nothing and they take it all". There's even a hint in the language you hear from players and coaches "we're treating this as a final", suggests there is just that difference between the natural context of a 6N game, to that of a knockout or final. Note I'm saying "different" here, not "more/less" etc. The caveat here is the tour win in NZ, which comes a lot closer to the context of a tournament. Could ROG have therefore derailed the momentum of the Irish setup before the RWC? Discussion for another day...

But if one of the provinces can bring home a European title, I think the changing room of the national team can only improve. I'd rather have a chunk of the players buoyed by European success, and the rest envious of that, than the entire cohort fighting their anxieties about whether they can get the job done.

tl:dr Munster should be allowed sign Ox Nche.

Andrew Porter talking about the World Cup and more on the 'Rugby Pod' on YouTube. A very very good interview. Worth a watch.

Not sure how to post a link but it's worth a watch.

The 15 that took to the field v La Rochelle last year was all Irish qualified if I remember.

Leinster could of gone and signed an Ezebeth or a big star like that, Im sure they have the money if they needed it but im sure someone in the IRFU would have said that would hamper big Joe. As luck would have it he got injured most of the season and wasn't in a position to be the impact off the bench

Plus, keep Ryan on that pitch...who knows

Sorry just seen this, yes I agree. But when Leinster went to sign someone they would have asked for a Ezebeth type World star and the IRFU would have said no, Big Joe is coming. Was that better for Ireland? of course.

The model at the moment of signing decent quality players like Ngatai etc I think is working. The IRFU can't rival the French clubs for a big star and they shouldn't, that money can be used for future Irish stars

McCarthy missed a large part of last season so my assumption was Jenkins was preferred because of his experience. He only got 8 games last season and 285 mins