Ireland squad for France

I’m finding it increasingly difficult to get excited about the RBS Six Nations to tell the truth.

As regular readers will know we popped down to Navan last Thursday night to watch a cracking game between Ulster Ravens and Leinster A and on Saturday morning I had the pleasure of watching an enthralling match between Friends School Lisburn and Sullivan Upper School in the Northern Bank Schools’ Cup.

Comparing these two games of skill and passion to the over-hyped formulaic dross served up in the opening weekend of the Six Nations is like comparing chalk to cheese and is an indication of how the pressure of the occasion is stifling the performance.

In the case of the BBC, coverage of the Ireland Italy match was made all the worse by the puerile commentary of the English commentator who trotted out every misinformed cliché he could think of about the Irish and Italian players. It was a commentary made all the worst when combined with the jaundiced comments of the once great Ulster player Phil Matthews who, I hope, in an effort to appear unbiased, picks and pokes and prods at any minor error made by Ulster players when they run out in the green.

As it was, the game was so exciting that I fell asleep. When I nodded off Andrew Trimble was easily the most effective player on show and when I woke up he was being replaced by Earls with Matthews slating his (Trimble’s) kicking game as the Ulsterman trotted off the pitch. Well, Trimble must have really had a shocking 30 odd minutes as I snoozed away because he now finds himself benched, or even dropped all together, for the French outing.

I did manage to see the full contribution from Tom Court as he came on for a shattered Hayes with ten minutes to go. Propping at tight instead of his usual loose, Court made an impressive impact as he tore into his opposite number at scrum time and can count himself exceptionally unlucky to be starting from the bench again on Saturday. He certainly made a better case for inclusion that Earls did.

Now we hear that Ferris is injured so it looks like there will be no Ulster men starting on Saturday. Court and Best will be on the bench and either Paddy or Trimble should claim the final spot but it’s a disappointing selection given the form of Trimble and Court in particular.

As far as the game goes, I expect France to win it, and win it fairly comfortably up front, and, unless O’Driscoll can produce his usual get out of jail free card, the French should have enough grunt to win by 10.

Ireland: R Kearney, T Bowe, B O’Driscoll (capt), G D’Arcy, K Earls, R O’Gara, T O’Leary, C Healy, J Flannery, J Hayes, L Cullen,  P O’Connell, AN Other, D Wallace, J Heaslip. Replacements (from): R Best, T Court, D Ryan, S O’Brien, K McLaughlin, E Reddan, J Sexton, P Wallace, A Trimble