Good research Harry, everybody knows that turnovers is now a second rower’s game.
Tadhg Beirne won 18 turnovers in 8 Champions cup. He has also won 37 turnovers in the pro 14 this season(setting a new record for turnovers won.) 55 turnovers isn’t bad for a second rower, eh?

The insufficient experienced depth is a really good point. You’d think that this will be the last real chance that there will be for new players to get blooded. From the start of next year, we could be in trouble if we are still handing out new caps.

Does it really matter, though Bakkies? I highly doubt if Ireland and Australia do meet in the Semis that Ireland will be having flashbacks to when their second team lost to Australia in Australia.

That’s the exactly the point I’m making. The media coverage in Ireland and in a lot of places has been based on how Schmidt turned an average bunch of players into six nations winners.

The reason I single Nucifora & Browne out for praise is because they have taken a huge amount of flack by some rugby fans in Ireland, despite their good work. They managed to retain the likes of Furlong, Murray and Sexton while at the same time spreading the talent by encouraging players like Copeland, Murphy and Oliver to move between provinces.

So yes, Schmidt deserves huge credit. There is a big difference between having the best players and having the best team.

Schmidt gets a lot of praise for Ireland’s win, but I think Nucifora deserves a lot more credit than he is getting. Nucifora with the aid of Browne, has manoeuvred the Irish provinces into a position where 2 of the top 3 club teams in Europe are Irish.

Schmidt is working with the best players in Europe, because of Nucifora. Having said that, Schmidt’s selection of James Ryan is one of the most intelligent selections I’ve ever seen. The easy option would have been to go for Molony/Holland/O’Connor.

I’d like to see more young players get an opportunity in Australia. For me, Deegan/Coombes and McPhilips/Johnston should get selected over the slightly more experienced, but far less talented options. I’d rest a lot of the Lions for this series. The second choice options at 15, 10, 9 and 8 could do with more playing time.

I’d like to see this team start against Australia.
1. Kilcoyne, 2. Scannell, 3. Porter, 4. Beirne, 5. Ryan, 6. Ruddock, 7. Leavy, 8. Conan, 9. Marmion ,10. Carbery, 11. Stockdale, 12. Aki, 13. Ringrose, 14. Wootton, 15. Larmour.
subs: 16. S. Cronin, 17. Buckley, 18. Bealham, 19. Dillane, 20. O’Brien, 21. McGrath, 22. Bleyendaal, 23. A.Byrne.

I’d definitely agree with that.

I think Australia are very well suited to take on Ireland. Any team that has beaten Ireland over the last two years has played a wide-wide game plan and exploited Ireland’s narrow defense. No team is going to beat Ireland playing with a narrow game plan. Ireland are the gain line king’s with Farrell’s defense.

For me, the crucial thing will be how much game time David Pocock gets. Dan Leavy has been the best player in this year’s six nations and he will put huge pressure on Australia’s breakdown. Another player that will definitely surprise Australia is a guy by the name of Tadhg Beirne. He is by some distance the best second rower in world rugby at the breakdown. He has won 36 turnovers for the Scarlets in the pro 14 this year. He has also won the most amount of breakdown turnovers in the European Champions Cup.

I hope I’m wrong, but Ireland will try to bully a fired up England team and fail. It’s easy to gain parity or get on top in the forwards when you’re at home when most of the refereeing calls are going your way, it’s close to impossible to do that away from home. Ireland really need a plan B for they are not dominating up front. Ireland need to be able to create something from nothing in the way that New Zealand, Australia, Wales and Scotland do. At the moment, Ireland have the worst counter attacking game of any of the tier 1 nations in world rugby.

To be honest, I don’t think Schmidt’s style would suit New Zealand at all, Neutral. Schmidt’s game plan involves a lot of powerful ball carriers crashing over the gain line in pods of 4/5. It would be pretty pointless for New Zealand to try and adapt that game plan. New Zealand’s strength lies in the ball handling of their pack and having, by some distance, the best backs in world rugby. Nick Bishop had a great line on Schmidt in one of his recent articles about the Six nations.

“Schmidt’s playing structures are lucid and effective, but during my time with England we felt there was a marked drop-off in Ireland’s performance when they were forced out to play outside of those structures.”

Schmidt is great at these three phase moves, but he doesn’t seem to be too interested in putting in place structures that facilitates a more intelligent, heads rugby game plan. There were a few occasions yesterday where Ireland had clear overlaps and were too busy sticking to the structure, to exploit them.

One of the best articles I’ve read anywhere for a while, thanks Nick.

Cory Hill is a really underrated player. I’ve long been of the opinion that having a Second Rower who can take the ball to gain line and pass is one of, if not the most, important players on the pitch. Watching Leone Nakarawa carry the ball is incredible. He draws in five players. It’s like a corner kick in football, there are three players trying to mark the potential recipients of the inevitable offload and two players to stop him getting over the gain line .

“during my time with England we felt there was a marked drop-off in Ireland’s performance when they were forced out to play outside of those structures.”
I found this line really interesting. Is it because there aren’t enough heads-up, intelligent rugby players or is it just that they are trying so hard to retain the ball they refuse to try anything that might jeopardize possession. I suspect it’s somewhere in the middle.

You have a valid argument with England, but New Zealand always play heads up rugby. Do you remember New Zealand’s first try in the Lions series. They were 3 -0 up and got a penalty. They took the quick tap and scored in the corner.

I’m in favour of kicking to the post if you’re not getting front foot ball. Ireland were starting to get on top on two occasions, when they were three points up. They should have gone to the corner, imo.

You were spot on, FunBus.
I felt similarly about Scotland. They have an excellent backline, but with the exception of Watson, none of their forwards(injured or uninjured) would get into the English or Irish pack.
Good luck against Italy today.

Yeah Henshaw is not playing badly at the moment. I said maybe because I’m not sure who will be Ireland’s 15. If Larmour/Carberry/Stockdale start at 15, then it makes sense to play Henshaw at 13 for experience defensive solidity. Farrell is such an underrated player, though. He is 110kg, has a great step and has a slightly better passing game than Henshaw.

Thanks for the article, Oliver.
Jeez, that was as disappointing a 78 minutes of rugby that I’ve seen from Ireland since Schmidt took over. It’s one thing to be losing to a team who are playing well(Scotland + Wales last year), it’s another thing to play like that against a poor French team missing a lot of their best players(Fofana, Picamoles, Parra, Lopez.)

The coaching team seemed to learn nothing from the 2016 match in Paris. I’d love to know what the logic is in box-kicking/garryowens 25 meters from the opposition try line. Safety-first is always the option for this Ireland team. It’s very difficult to beat an opposition team 9-12 away from home. The best teams(England, New Zealand) kick for touch from penalties, when they are in the ascendancy.

The positives from the match were Sexton, Leavy, Aki and James Ryan. The rest were well below par and some players are still making the same mistakes they made last year. Looking forward i’d have Scannell at 2, Leavy at 7, Conan at 8, Larmour/Stockdale at 15 and maybe Farrell at 13 over Henshaw.

If it was in Ireland, it would be a 50-50.
Ireland have had a pretty poor away record(in the Six Nations), in recent years. Ireland have won only twice away in the last four years against the top 4 teams(Scotland, Wales, France, England.)

Great stuff Highlander.
Like Neutral, I am subscribed to most of the above podcasts, but I have been looking for a good Kiwi pod.
I agree about your point on New Zealand analysis. I remember listening to a Kiwi phone-in rugby sports show during the 2011 world cup in New Zealand. It was excellent and there was a real honesty to it. Looking forward to listening to Out of the Box Rugby Podcast.

Other podcasts I enjoy are:
The Attacking Scrum(Welsh) – Very similar to The Thistle Scottish Rugby Podcast except Welsh.
The Hard Yards(Irish) – Ronan O’Gara is on it regularly. It’s a great combo of rugby insight and fun, without having to demean players.
Blues Talk(Irish) is great for Leinster/pro 14 fans.
Second Captains(Irish)- Not strictly a rugby pod, but they spent the majority of the show every Monday talking about Rugby.

Enjoyable preview, thanks Harry.

I can see Scotland being bullied physically by a lot of teams in this six nations. I hope I’m wrong, as the Scotland-England game is the only realistic chance that England will get beaten in the six nations. After the World cup bid betrayal, SCOTLAND really need to repay the celtic brethren. This is the only way Ireland can win the six nations, imo. Ireland aren’t beating England at Twickenham.

France ????? Jeez. Dropping your best player is definitely an innovative new technique. Experience will be an issue. There is only one player over 30 in the French squad. Picking 4 looseheads and 1 tighthead in your squad is also frisky.

Dagg was only 23 at that world cup and had only been playing international rugby for one year, but I get your point.

To be honest, I would be ok with Kearney’s selection if he was reliable in defense. The reality is though, that Kearney makes really bad decisions in defense, and no longer has the pace to make up for it. I don’t mind missed one-on-one tackles, but spacing and reading the game is a real issue for Kearney. An example of this was the TJ Perenara try in Chicago last year. There was absolutely no need for Kearney to step in, it was obvious that Coles was going to offload. Ben Smith’s try in that game also came from Kearney stepping in when there was no need.

Could understand the logic in bringing it back to South Africa.
France will be great, but jeez, it seems like only yesterday they hosted.
With the World cup set to be expanded, this was Ireland’s last ever chance to host a major world cup.
I’m expecting one of Argentina/South Africa to get 2027. 2031 will go to USA/Canada/Italy. 2035 to England.

Fair play to the English, I hope we both annihilate Wales and Scotland in the six nations.

USA and Canada are my new favourite second teams.

O’Neill has done well, but every coach has lifespan, in my opinion. Iceland’s success has put every coach under pressure.

Great analysis piece, but please keep the football references out of it, Nick.
I came on here to get away from total football and Eriksen.

Agree with most of the things you’ve written Fionn.

The right Bok backs just aren’t being selected. A backline with Gelant, Mapimpi, Am and Combrink would scare any defence.

For me, Ireland’s counter attacking game still isn’t good enough. Stockdale and Conway are good in these situations, but Kearney just eats the space available for them.

Also, Ireland’s front five didn’t do too badly, did they? Iain Henderson had clearly been reading the Roar.

Thanks for the article, Declan.
“Rob Kearney made a welcome return to international rugby at fullback – his dependency under the high ball was something South Africa sorely lacked.” Not so sure about this. Firstly, the kicks were far too long from Cronjé, secondly even with the amount of space Kearney got, he never ever looked like beating the first man.

Kearney is up there with Dempsey as Ireland’s greatest full-back, but Ireland aren’t going to be contenders for a world cup with him there. The current version of Kearney is being selected solely for his kicking and fielding. He makes terrible decisions in defence, refuses to pass-regardless of whether or no there’s an overlap and also lacks the pace that Folau, Smith, Hogg or even Brown have. Also, he will be 33 at the next world cup.

I think Tiernan O’Halloran, Stockdale, Carbery, Conway and Larmour should be the only players in contention for the 15 jersey, leading into the next world cup.

He’s definitely out of his depth, Harry.
It’s never nice seeing someone being publicly humiliated, so I feel sorry for Coetzee and his family.
Rassie would improve the Springboks immediately. Also, Jacques Nienaber could be the Springbok defence coach for the next 10 years.
Munster’s weakness under Rassie was lack of creativity in attack, so if the Springboks could hire some Kiwi attack coach they would have the real deal.
Other coaches that the Springboks should look at imo, Dave Rennie, Mark McCall and Jamie Joseph.

“J Carbery – the one player who I think is one step away from being clobbered for his fancy dancing”- This is so accurate. I’ve yet to see a result other than a line break or a high-tackle penalty when Carbery get’s the ball.

I’m expecting the Springboks to dominate the lineout.
Rob Kearney will try and run over Etzebeth, everytime he get’s the ball.
“Killer” Kilcoyne vs Louw will be really interesting. I was hoping that “the continuity” Dreyer brings, would keep him in the squad.