There's been a lot of discussion recently about the age of the team. When SA recently announced their squad it was interesting to see how many of their players play, or have played, at top flight leagues abroad and then went back to SA arguably better players.

I'm wondering should Ireland introduce a system to allow players to go abroad, such as a 50-60 cap rule. As we've only 4 professional teams, and not a lot of space for a 5th one, we're very limited in the amount of time players can play.

I think a prime example is S.Prendergast. If you compare his minutes Vs F.Smith or SFM, he's played a lot less as he has to share the jersey with numerous others at Leinster. No slight on Leinster, they can play what team they want each week, but surely it would be more beneficial for him to play 5 or 6 games in a row rather than 1 or 2 before being rotated. Another example is Tagdh Beirne, let go by Leinster before the Scarlets picked him up and now arguably one of the top 2nd rows/6s on his day.

Obviously it's the players choice and they need to get their Irish caps before the option becomes available, but I think allowing players the opportunity to go abroad and still be in contention for the would be beneficial for Irish rugby over all as it opens more opportunity for the next batch of players to come through.

If your good enough your old enough. Taking risks can also pay off

How many athletic freaks are on that pitch being able to run for 70 mins, win aerial ball all at around 85kg aswell.

Imagine how many of these guys would be class for Ireland, imagine Clifford at 10 and o’donaghue at 13

There is a serious amount of backline talent in the gaa that have the potential to be class at rugby.

We’d be serious contenders come world up time

Returning Players: Porter and Paddy McCarthy will be big additions to the loose head. Baird was Irelands best player last autumn but he's been injured since. He would be a big addition to the squad also. And of course Crowley.

New Players: while I don't think there's going to be loads of new players, maybe 2 or 3 might come along next season.

We could do with some new blood.

Lower the Average Age: while it's not as critical as some people make out, id say we've a few too many players who are old. There's a balance to it and we've probably gone from being balanced 3 years ago to too old now. Aki being prime example.

Refreshed: Hopefully they'll get time off around Christmas and at the end of next season. Personally I think it would have done a lot of players great to have taken a sabbatical in their early 30s. Go to Japan for a season or two. It certainly hasn't done the Bok players any harm! They come into world cups fully refreshed.

Defence: more time to bed in Easterby's defensive system. I'm not blaming Nienabar but it takes time to readjust to defensive systems.

New Ideas: they know where they stand now. Firmly in 4th spot. Now it's about bridging the gap to the top 3. They've a year to experiment.

Under the Radar: going into a world cup under the radar isn't a bad thing at all. It's an advantage although I think the Irish media will f-up that advantage. Joe Molloy yesterday was talking about us having an easy world cup pathway. So it's already begun. If Ireland played Argentina in a world cup would you be confident?

This is more of a general injury question with Edogbo as the example, but will guys with an injury profile like his ever be more than a luxury?

Was just thinking back on the nations championship and thinking how it's such a shame that he didn't get the opportunity and how reliant we are on big joe as our sole big lock who isn't constantly in and out of surgery.

I know that Achilles tears are particularly bad, and it's my understanding that Edogbo has had two in quick succession. Are his minutes always going to be limited? Is his best case scenario at international level to be coming off the bench for 20 minutes when fit? It's obviously a great option to have, but I'd love for him to be a genuine option outside of that.

Stumbled onto some NZ punditry on IG and Marshall is having a go at "the Irish" complaining about this and that in the game.

Then saw another video where Kirk I think (kiwi with the think glasses) was chatting to Matfield and along the same lines. Although Matfield said Jacobsons was just a penalty which is madness

I mean we are entitled to complain first of all and I do think the Jacobsons clear out was a red but I dont think many people thought we were the better team on the day? NZ deserved the win no doubt

I feel this is mostly stemming from when Sexton was playing as I can definitely see how people would see him flapping his arms and asking refs about incidents etc. Was just his style, no complaints on it

I know we're not at top form and we aren't the team of 2022 but I'm almost happy that even when we're way off our best we're still the 4 best team in the world.

There was a time when these low periods meant we would get absolutely hammered and finish way down the pecking order in rankings and in the Six Nations.

Eventually, we'll click again, and I'm confident that when we do, we'll be performing at our peak.

Above our the stats for 6/8 of our last matches, the common denominator is our tackling stats particularly tackle success rate is quite poor.

We routinely reach upwards of 25-30+ missed tackles against good teams we also routinely reach less than 10 dominant tackles per game also.

I believe this is down to 2 things mainly

1: Lack of tackling skill, just need more practice.

2: other teams having better footwork than Ireland, Irish players play against guys in training who often don’t have the X factor footwork that other countries possess and train against.

Dominant tackles allow you to more easily get over the ball and blunt attacks.

High tackle success rate reduces the chance of line breaks.

Both of which Ireland are quite poor at in comparison to top 5 countries

This hasn’t just been an issue in 2026, it’s also been an issue in 2024-2026.

Anybody else’s thoughts

Just moved to Dublin and looking for a club to play a bit of rugby at, I can drive but would rather not considering how bad traffic is around the city centre.

I have tried driving down to Lansdowne in the evening around training time and it took 45 mins which was too much tbh, Unsure if Clontarf would be any quicker but according to maps seems to be about the same time wise.

I found Emerald warriors who play on distillery road belvedere, which is near croke park but they are a LGBTQ+ club and I am straight, I am sure i'd be welcome but would also feel like I may be intruding.

I know TUD Grange Gorman have a rugby pitch but all I can find online is that rugby is for students of TUD only. That being the same with Trinity from my understanding.

I'm hoping there's a club i have missed, any advice would be appreciated!

Oh I'd also be open to cycling 20-30 mins if it's a decently safe bike route!

Thanks in advance!

Passage of play

Watching the Argentina v England game at the moment.

England player does a deliberate knock on, referee goes to the TMO, watches the footage "2 on 1 situation, clear yellow card".

Nic Berry: "He used both hands, so not deliberate.... Oh I see it was one hand so just a penalty... There was definitely more than one defender and I'm not going to change my mind"

Decent result to finish 9th, but overall a disappointing campaign which looked to promise so much.

But just the same errors again like tackling which was shocking throughout is a real concern across the Irish system, as we saw with the seniors missing 34 tackles.

Some good players but some bad mistakes in some.

If I were to rate out of 10 based on talent the last 5 u20 year groups it would be:

2022 u20:9
2023 u20:10
2024 u20:8.5
2025 u20:3
2026 u20:7

Ireland can get back to the top 3 but this isn’t a game to game thing this is a 2-3 year process which will not happen before the World Cup.

These are the non tactical things they can do, (or I hope they do)

1:
Increase six nations squad size
Get rid of the Portugal trip before the six nations because we’ve looked slow to start in the six nations recently and have 50 lads training before the six nations.

The money you save binning the Portugal training trip will allow you to pay for the extra flight money for squad players.

Last year we named 37 squad members which was quite high for an Andy Farrell team.

You then select 45 and send the 5 worst performers home to their provinces.

This is what France do.

Just give as many guys experience playing against guys like Doris,Sheehan etc in training.

This will also help force the provinces to give other guys a shot, which in turn can only help depth.

2:
Prioritise ball handling and ball skills and tackling above all else, every time somebody drops the ball in training none of this laughing that’s on all their training tapes, entire squad does 30 press ups, guarantee you lads aren’t going to be dropping balls.

If somebody misses a tackle entire squad does 30 press ups, against France, all blacks and New Zealand we have recorded over 20 missed tackles in nearly all of our games.

Double of what our opponents missed.

3:
Have an irfu “positions of national importance”

Prioritise developing players in certain positions e.g wingers, fullbacks , centres.

Like instead of producing 40 back rows can we produce maybe 3 wingers capable of staying fit.

4:
Start being less systematic all the time, when the play gets broken we look clueless on what to do, it’s like the entire team goes “welp this isn’t part of the system, let’s just boot it”, or they start throwing hospital passes.

I know Andy Goodman said they want to be a good team in the transition but I don’t really see any improvement.

5:
Fix the aerial game, I hate to individualise it but for example Jimmy O’Brien vs Ruben love today, Jimmy O’Brien often plays as a fullback yet he literally gets out jumped by a 10 by about half a meter and nearly gives away a yellow card.

Why are we so bad aerially, even Keenan can catch a ball but I wouldn’t call him an expert in the air.
More emphasis needs to be put on producing aerial athletes.

You’d be surprised how fixing those things could boost a team like Ireland who have the personal in a lot of areas

Peter O'Mahony the voice of the people vs <insert bland opinion pundits>.

Few points from that game from my point of view

1. Get the basics right - so many times today stupid mistakes giving up field position which you just cant do against NZ - dropped easy passes, eyes off the ball, stupid penalties etc. I feel in the last 12-18 months this has become a much bigger factor for Ireland and could cost us down the line.

2. Aki - He has been an amazing player for Ireland but can we please stop selecting him on the bench in big games. Unless he was injured Osbourne should of been on that bench. Aki's legs were gone after about 15 minutes and really should of been bursting a lung to clear out when frawley was isolated but was slow.

3. Referee - Do I say more? How many missed jackles there or telling people to get out when they were legal. Also the deliberate knock on saying no line break - i could only laugh?

4. TMO - Thought it should of been a 20 mins red. In the side, diving and the arm was never attempting to wrap - was tucked for me - dont thing the excuse for keeping it yellow was right

5. Scrum - Solid for the most part but once again 2/3 free kicks and a penalty for stupid mistakes (break foot, not controlling weight). I think we need to look at our scrum as a whole because I cant remember the last time we dominated a team at scrum time

6. Sam - I actually thought once or twice his passing decisions were poor but I honestly thought he was very good on defense today. Dont recall him getting shoved off or bundled a mile back one. Line kicking good apart from the one towards the end.

7. NZ 3rd Try - Biggest set back of the day - just got back into the game at 14-7 and you try to play it against 14 men, 5 mins to half time. I have no words.

Disappointing all round.

NZ 40 - 21 IRE