Ireland v England. Saturday, February 2nd.

[fourthirtythree]

I don't see why we gave up on him instead of trying to improve him.

Neither do I, train him to stop letting the ball bounce and having chaos ensue defensively and he could have been devastating from full back and he could have been used from the start to come in when Sexton is taken off etc. etc.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

I see Cole has been released back to the Tigers. I've seen him a few times recently and thought he was back to his best and had cut out the silly penalties, surprised they've left him out but think they'll miss him at the breakdown. I would have thought you'd want someone like that when you know you're going to be defending a lot of phases in your 22, good news for us IMO.

England haven't had much of a plan for their attack for the guts of two years now and I reckon they're doubling down on the power and physicality this year instead of trying to come up with any kind of fluid attacking game. Billy V (who has more to his game in fairness but his carrying is probably the most crucial part of their game) and Tuilagi will obviously suit that and improve them, but I'm not sure that's the way to go against us. The teams that have troubled us in the past couple of seasons have all had ballers popping up in midfield to stretch our defence IIRC. I presume Brown will be at fullback but if they had Goode (no idea why they keep ignoring him) then I reckon they'd be much better off.

[jimbobjoe]

I see Cole has been released back to the Tigers. I've seen him a few times recently and thought he was back to his best and had cut out the silly penalties, surprised they've left him out but think they'll miss him at the breakdown. I would have thought you'd want someone like that when you know you're going to be defending a lot of phases in your 22, good news for us IMO.

England haven't had much of a plan for their attack for the guts of two years now and I reckon they're doubling down on the power and physicality this year instead of trying to come up with any kind of fluid attacking game. Billy V (who has more to his game in fairness but his carrying is probably the most crucial part of their game) and Tuilagi will obviously suit that and improve them, but I'm not sure that's the way to go against us. The teams that have troubled us in the past couple of seasons have all had ballers popping up in midfield to stretch our defence IIRC. I presume Brown will be at fullback but if they had Goode (no idea why they keep ignoring him) then I reckon they'd be much better off.

Sinkler starting with Harry williams? on the bench. Sinkler can be good but he's a serious liability for them if you get up his nose.

[Dave Cahill]

Joe may pick Rob or he may pick Rob, but lets not forget that a lot of this talk has come on the back of an article from a journalist who suggested that Leinster would be starting a player who isn't even in the European squad for the game against Toulouse a couple of weeks ago

[MylesNaGapoleen]

I see Cole has been released back to the Tigers. I've seen him a few times recently and thought he was back to his best and had cut out the silly penalties, surprised they've left him out but think they'll miss him at the breakdown. I would have thought you'd want someone like that when you know you're going to be defending a lot of phases in your 22, good news for us IMO.

England haven't had much of a plan for their attack for the guts of two years now and I reckon they're doubling down on the power and physicality this year instead of trying to come up with any kind of fluid attacking game. Billy V (who has more to his game in fairness but his carrying is probably the most crucial part of their game) and Tuilagi will obviously suit that and improve them, but I'm not sure that's the way to go against us. The teams that have troubled us in the past couple of seasons have all had ballers popping up in midfield to stretch our defence IIRC. I presume Brown will be at fullback but if they had Goode (no idea why they keep ignoring him) then I reckon they'd be much better off.

agreed. sounds like they are going all out with the bulldozer game plan. The welsh twigged last year that going wide was the key against us and nearly pulled it off late in the game. It looks like we will have, apart from rob and marmion, the same team that beat NZ in the autumns on saturday.

Not sure of the weather forecast for sat...but I think we will win it in a low-scoring arm wrestle. just hoping we don't pick up any injuries from the bulldozing chariot.

[Lar]

Not sure of the weather forecast for sat...but I think we will win it in a low-scoring arm wrestle. just hoping we don't pick up any injuries from the bulldozing chariot.

Looks like it will be damn cold but dry and not too breezy. If you can believe a forecast this far out.

[Logorrhea]

Joe may pick Rob or he may pick Rob, but lets not forget that a lot of this talk has come on the back of an article from a journalist who suggested that Leinster would be starting a player who isn't even in the European squad for the game against Toulouse a couple of weeks ago

Rob is finished. Just like he was finished all those other times he was finished.

[artaneboy]

Joe may pick Rob or he may pick Rob, but lets not forget that a lot of this talk has come on the back of an article from a journalist who suggested that Leinster would be starting a player who isn't even in the European squad for the game against Toulouse a couple of weeks ago

Rob is finished. Just like he was finished all those other times he was finished.

Eventually that prediction will be right; but I don’t think this is it either. But leaving aside this 6Ns campaign, Henshaw going to full back looks a good longer term option.

Ireland doesn’t lose a lot with Bundee and Gary in the centre. And I think the attacking threat that Robbie would give country (and province- in time) would be an ideal strategic option option that we don’t really have anymore with Rob.


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[etak252]

Rob is no more finished but I can definitely see the merit in trying Robbie at full back .

[MylesNaGapoleen]

Rob is no more finished but I can definitely see the merit in trying Robbie at full back .

agreed on both counts. lets see how henshaw works out at FB. it is his favourite position apparently - according to luke fitz in the left wing podcast. https://soundcloud.com/the-left-wing

[fourthirtythree]

Luke has history with "favourite position".!

[Peg Leg]

Someone on here asked if Joe would (a) experiment for the RWC or (2) go all out to win the 6N. Considering the tried and tested alternatives already in the squad, Robbie's selection there is somewhere in between.

[Oldschool]

Someone on here asked if Joe would (a) experiment for the RWC or (2) go all out to win the 6N. Considering the tried and tested alternatives already in the squad, Robbie's selection there is somewhere in between.

IIRC the same someone suggested somewhere in between was likely.

[flustered]

I see Thornley has Nathan White in the squad for Saturday!

[neill_m]

England 23

Daly; Nowell, Slade, Tuilagi, May; Farrell (c), Youngs; M.Vunipola, George, Sinckler; Itoje, Kruis; Wilson, T.Curry, B.Vunipola

Cowan-Dickie, Genge, Williams, Lawes, Hughes; Robson, Ford, Ashton

[CiaranIrl]

England 23

Daly; Nowell, Slade, Tuilagi, May; Farrell (c), Youngs; M.Vunipola, George, Sinckler; Itoje, Kruis; Wilson, T.Curry, B.Vunipola

Cowan-Dickie, Genge, Williams, Lawes, Hughes; Robson, Ford, Ashton

Surprised (and glad) Ashton isn't starting and that Mike Brown isn't Fullback. I didn't think Johnny May would be in the team.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Scrap what I said about them doubling down on the power game then, the rumoured team I saw didn't have Slade or Daly in it. It'll be interesting to see if they know what they're doing though because it's been a long time since they did, although Slade (who I'm a huge fan of at club level) has looked more comfortable at international level recently.

We're usually really good at tracking runners but it'll be hard to catch May/Nowell/Ashton trailing behind Billy V and Hughes if the game opens up.

I would imagine May will actually be on the left wing, can't see them letting Stockdale face up to him again. It's not the most physically imposing back three, suspect we'll really go after them in the air.

Slightly surprised Youngs is playing, he's been in awful form recently.

[Ruckedtobits]

The mid-field I hope they don't pick is Farrell, Tuilagi and Slade which combines physique, aggression and intelligence. The one they may pick is Ford, Farrell and T'eo which combines Kicking, High-Tackling and Bullocking. Joe would be happy with the latter.

So, not happy that they did pick that Mid-field. Also note the selection of Kruis instead of Launsbury in the row. Happy they've picked that back-row and glad Cole was released.

Jones wants to try and beat us up in certain areas and is convinced he has enough ball-carriers in Sinckler, George, Itoje and the Vunipolas, with Farrell & Tuilagi taking the ball to the line. Tough, tough encounter on a wet, cold February Saturday.

Will be surprised if either team reach 20 pts.

[LeRouxIsPHat]

Why do you like that they've picked that back row RTB? Look pretty good to me!

[wixfjord]

15. Robbie Henshaw
14. Keith Earls
13. Garry Ringrose
12. Bundee Aki
11. Jacob Stockdale
10. Jonathan Sexton
9. Conor Murray

1. Cian Healy
2. Rory Best (Captain)
3. Tadhg Furlong
4. Devin Toner
5. James Ryan
6. Peter O’Mahony
7. Josh van der Flier
8. CJ Stander

Replacements

16. Sean Cronin
17. Dave Kilcoyne
18. Andrew Porter
19. Quinn Roux
20. Sean O’Brien
21. John Cooney
22. Joey Carbery
23. Jordan Larmour

No Jack is a surprise, I guess he hasn't been performing consistently enough.