Ireland confirm World Cup squad
Ireland have publicly announced their World Cup squad six days ahead of schedule, after a number of high profile omissions were leaked this morning.
As reported on RugbyPass, Devin Toner, Jordi Murphy, Kieran Marmion and Will Addison have all failed to make Joe Schmidt’s final 31-man squad for Japan.
Toner’s omission will come as the biggest surprise, with the 67-time capped lock a regular feature in Schmidt’s squads to date. However, he has paid the ultimate price following an injury disrupted end to the season with Leinster.
The big beneficiary of Toner’s exclusion in Jean Kleyn, who only became eligible to play for Ireland last month. The versatile Munster player can cover both lock and the back row.
Schmidt has previously shown huge faith in both Marmion and Murphy, but the pair have not done enough to make the plane for Japan. Ireland will travel with Conor Murray and Luke McGrath as their two scrum-halves for the tournament.
Rhys Ruddock has been included ahead of Murphy. Schmidt’s back row options for Japan will include Peter O’Mahony, CJ Stander, Jack Conan, Josh van der Flier and Ruddock, while Kleyn, Iain Henderson and Tadhg Beirne provide extra cover.
https://twitter.com/IrishRugby/status/1168492521992937472
Addison misses out despite offering cover in a number of positions, and a solid performance in Saturday’s 22-17 defeat of Wales. As reported on RugbyPass this morning, Andrew Conway and Chris Farrell are both included.
There is no place for Ulster bound prop Jack McGrath.
As expected, Joey Carbery is included as he continues his recovery from the ankle injury sustained in the opening World Cup warm-up game against Italy. Jack Carty will provide extra cover alongside first choice out-half Johnny Sexton, with Leinster’s Ross Byrne missing out.
Keith Earls is also named despite sitting out all three of Ireland’s warm-up fixtures so far.
In a statement accompanying the squad release, Schmidt said the selection process was “a very very difficult conundrum to try to solve”.
“It was a difficult thing right from the start to have the 45 that we had,” Schmidt said.
‘We went down to 40 players and to go from 40 down to 31 was really difficult, but we had a process whereby we looked back through every training, looked through the games.
“There were some guys who obviously had more experience and probably had more credit in the bank and were more established and there were other guys who were trying to force their way into group and trying to get a balance of current form versus previous performance, it’s always a very very difficult conundrum to try to solve.
“It was one of those typical selection meetings where maybe 20-25 of the players are listed straight away and it’s those ones where you’re are trying to get balance where it’s very difficult to choose between two players and two players offer slightly different things and you’re trying then to narrow down and trying to get the best balance across the squad of the entire 31 because that’s part of what you need to do because you’ve got to make sure you have cover that’s immediate even though you can replace players there is obviously a big time delay in that.”
Watch: Joe Schmidt on the Ireland Rugby World Squad.#RWC2019 https://t.co/Poo8absd58
— Irish Rugby (@IrishRugby) September 2, 2019
In a video released by the IRFU, Schmidt went into further detail on some of the big calls.
“I’ve coached Dev for ten years, and he’s not just a lineout champion for us. He’s such a good player, but he’s an absolutely quality person. That was an incredibly tough conversation yesterday.
“Jean Kleyn, we probably don’t have a specialist tighthead second row, as such. And again, at the start I said about the balance we’re looking for across that squad of 31. So Jean Kleyn fitted that.
“Tadhg Beirne gives you the versatility of both the second row, and he’s teamed up with Jean Kleyn really well in Munster this year. But he also gives you the threat over the ball like a 6 or 7 would, and can play in the back row.”
Schmidt also said that Addison was particularly unlucky to lose out on a spot in the squad.
“I thought Will was really good on Saturday. Unfortunately for Will, it’s all just come a little bit too late. He picked up a little bit of a calf niggle after having come back and not having played the back end of the season, and he hadn’t had that much time with us. But he fits in so well and plays so well.”
Ireland continue their World Cup preparations with a final warm-up game against Wales in Dublin on Saturday.
IRELAND’S 31-MAN WORLD CUP SQUAD
Forwards (17)
Rory Best, Tadhg Beirne, Jack Conan, Sean Cronin, Tadhg Furlong, Cian Healy, Dave Kilcoyne, Iain Henderson, Jean Kleyn, Peter O’Mahony, Andrew Porter, Rhys Ruddock, James Ryan, John Ryan, Niall Scannell, CJ Stander, Josh van der Flier
Backs (14)
Bundee Aki, Joey Carbery, Jack Carty, Andrew Conway, Keith Earls, Chris Farrell, Robbie Henshaw, Rob Kearney, Jordan Larmour, Luke McGrath, Conor Murray, Garry Ringrose, Jonathan Sexton, Jacob Stockdale
World Cup city guide: Kumamoto
Comments on RugbyPass
Why cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to commentsBig difference from the Saders. Forwards really muscled up and laid a solid platform. Scooter brought some steel and I liked the loosie combination. Newell has been rather disappointing this season but stepped up big time - happy also to see Franks dot down. He should do that more often! Reihana had a good game and there seems to be more flair and invention with him in the saddle. McNicoll plays well from the back and is reliable plus inventive when he joins the line. Keep it up chaps!
3 Go to comments🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
31 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
4 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusaders , you can keep going.
3 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
31 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
31 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
31 Go to comments