Ireland v. France Sun 10 March 15.00

[dropkick]

It gets lots of size into the team, lots of big men to go toe-to-toe with the French and not lose the f*cking collisions for the first time this tournament.

This, for me, has been Ireland's biggest problem. We aren't winning nearly enough of our collisions. I wonder if this is due in part to other teams analyzing Ireland's play well. So much of Ireland's phase play has been based on strong forward collisions getting over the gainline until a pre-set strike move is called. Opposition teams seem to have figured out that if they double up the tacklers on the (usually) obvious ball carrier, they can rob Ireland of the gain line success they need to initiate the strike moves effectively. The solution from Ireland's perspective has to involve overcoming those double tackles which will either involve powerful pods to carry, or shifting the play away from where the defence have set up their double tackles.

Ireland have scored 1 try in their last 4 games against France in the 6 nations. That's 0.25 tries per game. Schmidt's low risk, collision based game struggles against the French and it took that miracle drop goal to win the grand slam last year.


I'd like to see less collisions and a looser type of game plan but I don't think it's going to happen. I think kicking long to the french and hoping they make mistakes is also an option.

[backrower8]

So disappointed to see Stander back and likely straight into the team after a 5 week absence.

The man is a Cul de Sac of a player who has stymied Conan’s development and will slow the development of other Irish-born and bred 8s like Deegan and Doris. Though a nice person and committed he is a mercenary, as are Aki & Roux. Of course it is an international issue of which New Zealand, Australia, England and France are the biggest “beneficiaries”.

[Logorrhea]

So disappointed to see Stander back and likely straight into the team after a 5 week absence.

The man is a Cul de Sac of a player who has stymied Conan’s development and will slow the development of other Irish-born and bred 8s like Deegan and Doris. Though a nice person and committed he is a mercenary, as are Aki & Roux. Of course it is an international issue of which New Zealand, Australia, England and France are the biggest “beneficiaries”.

That comment started off wrong, got worse, picked up a little then finished with total irrelevant shite. Impressive.

[blockhead]

So disappointed to see Stander back and likely straight into the team after a 5 week absence.

The man is a Cul de Sac of a player who has stymied Conan’s development and will slow the development of other Irish-born and bred 8s like Deegan and Doris. Though a nice person and committed he is a mercenary, as are Aki & Roux. Of course it is an international issue of which New Zealand, Australia, England and France are the biggest “beneficiaries”.

That comment started off wrong, got worse, picked up a little then finished with total irrelevant shite. Impressive.

[Twist]

Team named

1 - Healy
2 - Best
3 - Furlong
4 - Henderson
5 - Ryan
6 - O’Mahony
7 - van der Flier
8 - Stander
9 - Murray
10 - Sexton
11 - Stockdale
12 - Aki
13 - Ringrose
14 - Earls
15 - Kearney

16 - Scannell
17 - Kilcoyne
18 - Ryan
19 - Dillane
20 - Conan
21 - Cooney
22 - Carty
23 - Larmour




Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[bails]

A few thoughts

Is John Ryan considered a better tight head than Andrew Porter ? Maybe we are going to concede the scrums in the last 20 minutes as thats when the scrum has folded on 2 of Ryan's last international games
Is a fit Tadgh Beirne not worthy of a place on the bench.
Is Conor Murray fully fit and capable of playing to international standard. His passing, kicking and management of the breakdown have been very poor by his standards. Should a few more matches for Munster not have been on his radar

In Joe we trust, but finding some of his selections very hard to understand.

[wixfjord]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.
Tadhg Beirne isn't fit according to Schmidt.
Murray is obviously not fully fit, but I think it's probably on balance the right thing to start him and try to get him back into the form we know he can bring.

[fourthirtythree]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.

And last! He's the business. I'm a big Ryan fan. While I thought it was absolutely right to promote Kilcoyne I get the criticisms of him and they are valid. I think Ryan seems to be underrated.

[bails]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.
Tadhg Beirne isn't fit according to Schmidt.
Murray is obviously not fully fit, but I think it's probably on balance the right thing to start him and try to get him back into the form we know he can bring.

Can't agree with you on that one !
Paris last 6 Nations, the penalty that put France into the lead on c76 mins was from a scrum, where John Ryan was penalised.
Similarly in Rome last weekend the only scrum we were penalised on , was late in the game when we went backwards and Ryan was penalised.

Recent memories on Ryan in an Ireland shirt

[bails]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.
Tadhg Beirne isn't fit according to Schmidt.
Murray is obviously not fully fit, but I think it's probably on balance the right thing to start him and try to get him back into the form we know he can bring.

Also dont agree about Murray using 6 Nations matches to regain form.
Why was he not starting for Munster last week, and the previous fallow weekend, two weekends previous.

If you look at the 6 Nations overall, our backline has not looked threathening in any way.
A large part of this has been because of a slovenly and slow service from Murray.
Sexton appears to be getting hit more often than normal, beacuse of the speed of pass he is receiving, and the knock on effect is our 12 gets tackled with the ball.
John Cooney last time noticeably speeded up play, when he was on, although I do appreciate that defenders were more tired late in the game.

Of course Murray is best scrum half in Ireland and we need him for word cup, but at present he is not doing us any favours and should be doing his match practice/rehab in his Club

[paddyor]

Ireland have scored 1 try in their last 4 games against France in the 6 nations. That's 0.25 tries per game. Schmidt's low risk, collision based game struggles against the French and it took that miracle drop goal to win the grand slam last year.


I'd like to see less collisions and a looser type of game plan but I don't think it's going to happen. I think kicking long to the french and hoping they make mistakes is also an option.

Why? Our handling has been the weakest part of our game so far in the championship.

[cormac]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.
Tadhg Beirne isn't fit according to Schmidt.
Murray is obviously not fully fit, but I think it's probably on balance the right thing to start him and try to get him back into the form we know he can bring.

Can't agree with you on that one !
Paris last 6 Nations, the penalty that put France into the lead on c76 mins was from a scrum, where John Ryan was penalised.
Similarly in Rome last weekend the only scrum we were penalised on , was late in the game when we went backwards and Ryan was penalised.

Recent memories on Ryan in an Ireland shirt

France didn't score from that scrum penalty. They missed and Ireland went 40+ phases from the 22 drop-out to score the winning drop goal.

France had taken the lead after Teddy Thomas' converted try.

[Experimental]

Would totally agree with the comments on Murray, hes not been his best and sexton is getting hit more as a result of his slow ball. Schmidt must not be afaid to replace him early if need be. Im surprised that Ryan is picked ahead of Porter, the only reason I can see for this is to give Ryan a big game and more experience. Conan imo is playing better than stander at the moment and also surprised hes not starting. Van der flier needs to carry more over the gainline, his defense and workrate are amazing, but his attack is poor compared to O'Brien and Leavy. Also would have put Marmion straight back in matchday squad (if not starting). A few of the selections have me scratching my head, but in Joe we trust

[hugonaut]

Would totally agree with the comments on Murray, hes not been his best and sexton is getting hit more as a result of his slow ball. Schmidt must not be afaid to replace him early if need be. Im surprised that Ryan is picked ahead of Porter, the only reason I can see for this is to give Ryan a big game and more experience. Conan imo is playing better than stander at the moment and also surprised hes not starting. Van der flier needs to carry more over the gainline, his defense and workrate are amazing, but his attack is poor compared to O'Brien and Leavy. Also would have put Marmion straight back in matchday squad (if not starting). A few of the selections have me scratching my head, but in Joe we trust

Ryan is likely to go to RWC.

Porter is the prop most capable of playing both sides; he played loosehead until last year. So he will definitely go to RWC. If we bring Healy, Kilcoyne and McGrath as looseheads with Furlong and Porter as tightheads, then lose a tighthead in the warm-up, we're in trouble. If we bring two looseheads and three tightheads [Furlong, Porter, Ryan] and loose a loosehead in the warm-up, we can put Porter across to loosehead sub.

We have much better strength in depth at loosehead than tighthead – Healy has 86 caps, McGrath 54 caps & Kilcoyne 27 caps [167 caps total] compared to Furlong on 31 caps, Ryan on 17 caps and Porter on 13 caps [61 caps total] – but we will end up bringing more tightheads than looseheads.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

I don't really see how we can play Murray back into form. By all accounts the injury meant that he lost a bit of size on whatever arm was affected so I would have thought he'd need to just spend time in the gym before being fully ready to play.

That said, I think the criticism has been OTT, although I'd have gone with Cooney this weekend.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Porter is the prop most capable of playing both sides; he played loosehead until last year.

Disagree, it's POM.

[bails]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.
Tadhg Beirne isn't fit according to Schmidt.
Murray is obviously not fully fit, but I think it's probably on balance the right thing to start him and try to get him back into the form we know he can bring.

Can't agree with you on that one !
Paris last 6 Nations, the penalty that put France into the lead on c76 mins was from a scrum, where John Ryan was penalised.
Similarly in Rome last weekend the only scrum we were penalised on , was late in the game when we went backwards and Ryan was penalised.

Recent memories on Ryan in an Ireland shirt

France didn't score from that scrum penalty. They missed and Ireland went 40+ phases from the 22 drop-out to score the winning drop goal.

France had taken the lead after Teddy Thomas' converted try.

Would you concede that it was Ryan who gave away the penalty at the scrum - the only penalty at scrum we conceded in the whole game.

[backrower8]

So disappointed to see Stander back and likely straight into the team after a 5 week absence.

The man is a Cul de Sac of a player who has stymied Conan’s development and will slow the development of other Irish-born and bred 8s like Deegan and Doris. Though a nice person and committed he is a mercenary, as are Aki & Roux. Of course it is an international issue of which New Zealand, Australia, England and France are the biggest “beneficiaries”.

That comment started off wrong, got worse, picked up a little then finished with total irrelevant shite. Impressive.

I also hold you in the highest esteem despite your inability to engage in anything other than purile, childish, sledging. However, I am encouraged by reference to "picked up a little" in your review.

If you said you think Stander is better than Conan and that you have no issue with foreign-born players shutting down the international careers of capable Irish-born players who spend their lives trying to represent their country then I would would respect you even more highly.

People like Conan, Deegan, Tom Farrell, Chris Farrell, Stuart McCloskey, Scannell & ROL would get to the level required if they had access to international game time instead of being blocked. Its a cop-out and scourge on the international game.

[hugonaut]

Porter is the prop most capable of playing both sides; he played loosehead until last year.

Disagree, it's POM.

You're right of course. O'Mahony for President. Four more years.

[Oldschool]

Based on the evidence this season I would consider Ryan a stronger scrummager than Porter yes.
Tadhg Beirne isn't fit according to Schmidt.
Murray is obviously not fully fit, but I think it's probably on balance the right thing to start him and try to get him back into the form we know he can bring.

I'd be happy with either Porter or Ryan on the bench.
Porter will be our LH/TH.
Marty Moore is the outside shot if one of our THs get injured.
Joe is breaking a golden rule by selecting Murray.
There is absolutely no justification for this selection.
None, Zilch, Nada, it's just wrong.
The Golden Rule - don't select unfit players.
Murray is unfit to play at international level.
He didn't even look great at HEC level if we are being honest and the trend hasn't shown any improvement.
Despite all the excuses and trust we have in Joe, the continued selection is having a destabilising effect on the squad's performance.
Hospital passes abound, a fact that has generally been ignored unless in relation to Sexton.
I'd personally be quite happy to go to the RWC with Marmion and Cooney as first choice than a malfunctioning Murray.