Dear Irish Fan

First topic message reminder :

Some questions:

1) We saw two Irelands on Saturday. For 44 minutes they were dynamic in attack, passed slickly and defended aggressively. Then at a switch they seemed to turn off, Wales came back at them and Ireland kicked the ball away constantly, were forced into tackling on the back foot and looked rather tentative. Which is the real Ireland under Kidney?

2) You will be installed as favourites to beat England on Sunday. Should you win, the tournament opens up quite nicely and a Grand slam becomes a tangible goal. Surely a GS would see Kidney safe in his job till RWC2015. How does this make you feel?

3) How are the injuries to D'Arcy and Earls? Should they be unfit who would be the replacements?

rodders wrote:

Standulstermen wrote:Yeah I think England's strength is the set piece. I woul be delighted with parity in the set piece. I think we need to target the breakdown with the likes of Best, O'Brien and Healy. I think behind the scrum we have more nous than England although much like Wales, England ar more powerful (not as big as Wales mind you).

I would hav England as healthy favourites

I agree with that stand except I think this England side are bigger and mor powerful than the Wales side we played last week. Maybe the wingers are smaller but England have some huge guys in the pack, Tuilagi in midfield and some real dynamism and power on the bench.

England definitely favourites.

No offence Rodders I just don't recognise the England pack you describe. People seem to rush to a default that England has a massive pack. We don't, we're not that team anymore (possibly sadly). I reckon our entire front five is lighter than yours. Haskell is a brute, Robshaw's fairly normal for a back-row but Wood is slight, Parling and Launchbury are not big by lock standards at all, T Youngs is tiny, and Marler and Cole and mobile (ish) first. Neither of them are Andy Sheridan sized, or even Corbs size.

We do not have a big pack, we're had far far bigger ones with much better individual carriers. If our pack wins now it wins by smoothering not bludgeoning. Had a similar debate with Nos on this on another thread.

In Ireland, Ireland are healthy favourites in my opinion.

Loving the way all the Irish fans are saying England are favourites and the England fans are all saying Ireland are favourites haha.

Hood83 wrote:

rodders wrote:

Standulstermen wrote:Yeah I think England's strength is the set piece. I woul be delighted with parity in the set piece. I think we need to target the breakdown with the likes of Best, O'Brien and Healy. I think behind the scrum we have more nous than England although much like Wales, England ar more powerful (not as big as Wales mind you).

I would hav England as healthy favourites

I agree with that stand except I think this England side are bigger and mor powerful than the Wales side we played last week. Maybe the wingers are smaller but England have some huge guys in the pack, Tuilagi in midfield and some real dynamism and power on the bench.

England definitely favourites.

No offence Rodders I just don't recognise the England pack you describe. People seem to rush to a default that England has a massive pack. We don't, we're not that team anymore (possibly sadly). I reckon our entire front five is lighter than yours. Haskell is a brute, Robshaw's fairly normal for a back-row but Wood is slight, Parling and Launchbury are not big by lock standards at all, T Youngs is tiny, and Marler and Cole and mobile (ish) first. Neither of them are Andy Sheridan sized, or even Corbs size.

We do not have a big pack, we're had far far bigger ones with much better individual carriers. If our pack wins now it wins by smoothering not bludgeoning. Had a similar debate with Nos on this on another thread.

In Ireland, Ireland are healthy favourites in my opinion.

Your pack is lighter than usual, front row is a similar size to ours but our second row and back row is giving up at least a half stone a man to yours. Robshaw is 17st 4 which half a stone heavier than O'Brien, Donnacha Ryan is a stone lighter than the English locks, O'Mahoney smaller than Wood, Haskell bigger than Heaslip. Only Mike Ross is heavier than his counterpart.....

Being light isn't a bad thing, that Irish pack is incredibly mobile, it is a big reason why the defence works, all are solid breakdown operators and they swarm around ball carriers. It could tell in the scrum, but in the loose, it shouldn't be as big a deal, they won't be blown on their arses too often at least

Ross must be relieved he is not facing Corbisiero - Marler is nowhere near the same standard of scrummager.
In the current RL style game pace and momentum count more than sheer bulk. I would have O'Brien in the England side like a shot because he has both but only him - the rest of the Irish pack can be got at and heads drop quickly.

The game will be decided by the FHs anyway as territory and pressure are the name of the game. Sexton should win that one.....maybe.

The English pack as always, is bigger and heavier than the Irish. Size isn't everything. But due to the laws of physics it still counts for something. Especially in the last 20 minutes or so. Ireland normally have to work very hard to match England physically and in the past that was enough to win because we had more quality behind the pack. I'm not sure that's true anymore.

Ireland looked like a really cohesive team for 45 minutes against Wales with both forwards and backs gelling well to confuse the Welsh and cause all sorts of problems. But England have looked like a very cohesive team for a while too. Lancaster has improved them hugely at the breakdown, where Ireland used to have an edge. And their attacking play has improved massively as a result of the quicker, cleaner ball they're getting.

I think Lancaster is doing a great job. I completely underestimated him in the beginning because he was (and still is) quite bad in front of the TV camera's.

Recwatcher wrote:Ross must be relieved he is not facing Corbisiero - Marler is nowhere near the same standard of scrummager.

At club level that's not even close to being true. Marler has yet to really dominate an international game, admittedly, but he had the better of Murray last week and got too much grief for his performance against Australia where he picked up a 5 week injury early on.

Our pack isn't that massive, as some others have said, but probably give the impression that they are just because of the intensity they're playing at compared to RWC 2011. Wood and T Youngs, for example, aren't bulky at all for their positions, but they're both incredibly aggressive. Morgan could be a loss against Ireland though. As well as Haskell played when he came on against Scotland, Heaslip and O'Brien are big carriers, and losing Morgan could hurt us in this area.

rodders wrote:

Hood83 wrote:

rodders wrote:

Standulstermen wrote:Yeah I think England's strength is the set piece. I woul be delighted with parity in the set piece. I think we need to target the breakdown with the likes of Best, O'Brien and Healy. I think behind the scrum we have more nous than England although much like Wales, England ar more powerful (not as big as Wales mind you).

I would hav England as healthy favourites

I agree with that stand except I think this England side are bigger and mor powerful than the Wales side we played last week. Maybe the wingers are smaller but England have some huge guys in the pack, Tuilagi in midfield and some real dynamism and power on the bench.

England definitely favourites.

No offence Rodders I just don't recognise the England pack you describe. People seem to rush to a default that England has a massive pack. We don't, we're not that team anymore (possibly sadly). I reckon our entire front five is lighter than yours. Haskell is a brute, Robshaw's fairly normal for a back-row but Wood is slight, Parling and Launchbury are not big by lock standards at all, T Youngs is tiny, and Marler and Cole and mobile (ish) first. Neither of them are Andy Sheridan sized, or even Corbs size.

We do not have a big pack, we're had far far bigger ones with much better individual carriers. If our pack wins now it wins by smoothering not bludgeoning. Had a similar debate with Nos on this on another thread.

In Ireland, Ireland are healthy favourites in my opinion.

Your pack is lighter than usual, front row is a similar size to ours but our second row and back row is giving up at least a half stone a man to yours. Robshaw is 17st 4 which half a stone heavier than O'Brien, Donnacha Ryan is a stone lighter than the English locks, O'Mahoney smaller than Wood, Haskell bigger than Heaslip. Only Mike Ross is heavier than his counterpart.....

Hang on, you're right, our entire front-row is smaller than yours. I know official IRFU/RFU stats are a little hazy but our hooker is lighter by about 1.5 stonnes. If Hartley plays we're equal on weight. Marler is lighter and less powerful than Healy, Cole is well over a stonne lighter than Ross. I'm not saying they're bang on but that's a massive difference to a large section of our pack.

In the locks Ryan's about a stonne off Parling and O'Callaghan is a couple of pounds off Launchbury. So fair enough.

If we're talking about the back row positions. O'Mahoney is giving away a lot of weight to Haskell (almost a stonne), Wood is a pound heavier than Heaslip but an inch taller and clearly not anymore powerful.Robshaw is about 5 pounds heavier than O'Brien, but also taller. O'Brien's a frickin cannonball.

I know i've mixed up weight and power here, and this is tedious pedantry, but I just don't see our pack being that much bigger, if at all. It's not just a lighter than usual England pack, it's just not very big.

...no but point is that all in you have the bigger pack, lightweight by your terms but generally bigger than ours... we won't win an armwrestle...

p.s McCarthy will be our second row not DOC.

rodders wrote:...no but point is that all in you have the bigger pack, lightweight by your terms but generally bigger than ours... we won't win an armwrestle...

p.s McCarthy will be our second row not DOC.

McCarthy's heavier

Fair enough. I don't think our pack is big enough for it to make any difference to be honest, but we'll have to agree to disagree I guess. I definitely think in Healy and SOB you have the better carriers. Thank heavens Ferris isn't there as well! I think this England team is a fair bit off and 3 or 4 players short of being genuinely decent. I don't think it has that many world class players. Really would like to see B Vunipola come on though, I think he could be pretty destructive in the last 25 mins or so.

thomh wrote:

Recwatcher wrote:Ross must be relieved he is not facing Corbisiero - Marler is nowhere near the same standard of scrummager.

At club level that's not even close to being true. Marler has yet to really dominate an international game, admittedly, but he had the better of Murray last week and got too much grief for his performance against Australia where he picked up a 5 week injury early on.

Our pack isn't that massive, as some others have said, but probably give the impression that they are just because of the intensity they're playing at compared to RWC 2011. Wood and T Youngs, for example, aren't bulky at all for their positions, but they're both incredibly aggressive. Morgan could be a loss against Ireland though. As well as Haskell played when he came on against Scotland, Heaslip and O'Brien are big carriers, and losing Morgan could hurt us in this area.

I think Corbs is still comfortably ahead of Marler as a strummager and ball carrier. IMO

fa0019 wrote:I love it here how cordial people are being on here.

"You are favourites", "no... you are favourites"

Slightly refreshing from the usual talk I get at home...

"who is going to win... springboks".

They have half their team injured, they're playing away in NZ and their selection policy is terrible..."Ok, but still springboks.. but by less points".

That's just how the Irish role.

They know that they're well equipped to spank us and secretly they expect this, they're just too cowardly to come out and say it

Waiting for the team announcement on the IRFU site.

Interesting to see the looped ad with Ulster Bank encouraging youngsters to hurl bricks around the gaff.

yappysnap wrote:

fa0019 wrote:I love it here how cordial people are being on here.

"You are favourites", "no... you are favourites"

Slightly refreshing from the usual talk I get at home...

"who is going to win... springboks".

They have half their team injured, they're playing away in NZ and their selection policy is terrible..."Ok, but still springboks.. but by less points".

That's just how the Irish role.

They know that they're well equipped to spank us and secretly they expect this, they're just too cowardly to come out and say it

It's not that. We're often quite bullish about our ability to beat England. But confidence is a bit short in the Irish fans after the bungles of the last few years. And you can't argue with England's last few performances.