For Once It's Ireland winning in the 83rd min. So goooood.

"The two guys from Connacht in the midfield".

Aboy Rog.

Ireland must win.

Bundee is 25/1 to score the first try tomorrow. Now wouldn't that be sweet......

Minor interesting point ,

The u20s no 4 Daly , his mother is from Mayo.

That's the second 2nd row for Ireland U20s (Ross Maloney is the other) where the Mother is from Mayo.

Even more bizarre is that both mothers are from the small village of Balla in Mayo.

Absolutely Bazzo. We'll see how good McGrath is with the French back row piling through on him in the latter stages tomorrow (that is if Schmidt even trusts bringing him on). IMHO he's inferior to Marmion in every aspect of scrum half play (speed, sidestep, pass off left or right, and pack management) except kicking from hand where McGrath does have the upper hand.

Mark Mostyn wrote:

MulMan wrote: taking the bias out of it, Cooney is playing better than them both, Joe's selections always infuriate me, but considering Reddan retained his place for so long while playing vastly inferior to Marmion it's even more frustrating.

I’m very surprised Cooney isn’t in the squad. Gonna be honest and say I don’t think Marmion has been great this season.

Marmion has been grand. One or two games below his usually high standards, many good games and a few exceptional games. The curse of the scrum half is that it's really very easy to look like a superstar behind a pack that is absolutely steamrolling everybody in their way(Leinster's 1st, 2nd, 3rd choice packs) and very easy to look laboured and and poor behind a pack that is losing the collisions and getting beat up quite often(all of our pack at times throughout the season).

From a purely Connacht/ selfish point of view having only one player in the squad may not be the worst thing ever. If any of the three boys had made the 23 there is a zero chance of them being released. But if Ireland do not need them ie no injuries /form issues there is a chance they could be released for the Ospreys game , which IMO is massive...

If any Clan are in Paris tomorrow night drop us a line

Sol_ie wrote: Irish Times still has (at 130) has this up:

"Leavy is included in the replacements as is scrumhalf Kieran Marmion, who won his tussle with Leinster’s Luke McGrath to fulfil the role as back-up to Conor Murray. "

But McGrath is named on the IRFU twitter etc. They must've been dead certain KM was going to get the nod.

Can't agree with the exclusion of some players, but can't say I'm surprised.

Having read your post Gerry just pulled a switcheroo on the names ...
"Leavy is included in the replacements as is scrumhalf Luke McGrath, who won his tussle with Connacht's Kieran Marmion to fulfil the role as back-up to Conor Murray."

MulMan wrote: taking the bias out of it, Cooney is playing better than them both, Joe's selections always infuriate me, but considering Reddan retained his place for so long while playing vastly inferior to Marmion it's even more frustrating.

I’m very surprised Cooney isn’t in the squad. Gonna be honest and say I don’t think Marmion has been great this season.

taking the bias out of it, Cooney is playing better than them both, Joe's selections always infuriate me, but considering Reddan retained his place for so long while playing vastly inferior to Marmion it's even more frustrating.

Betty Swallocks wrote: So the Dublin-centric media and influential figures such as O'Driscoll finally get their way on McGrath over Marmion. It's true what Ciaran Fitzgerald used to say - as a Connacht man you have to be twice as good as your opponent to win an Irish jersey.

To be fair Mcgrath is probably one of the most inform scrumhalves in World rugby at the minute, playing for the most inform club side in word rugby at the minute. I think he's earned an opportunity. Nothing to do with the media etc just a player doing better than another in the coaches eyes.
Sometimes as fans we need to take our provincial blinkers off at times.

So the Dublin-centric media and influential figures such as O'Driscoll finally get their way on McGrath over Marmion. It's true what Ciaran Fitzgerald used to say - as a Connacht man you have to be twice as good as your opponent to win an Irish jersey.

It's a shame for Marms he did not make the bench, but when you look at it without the Connacht jersey on McGrath has been playing out of his skin for Leinster both in the Pro14 and Champions Cup.

Irish Times still has (at 130) has this up:

"Leavy is included in the replacements as is scrumhalf Kieran Marmion, who won his tussle with Leinster’s Luke McGrath to fulfil the role as back-up to Conor Murray. "

But McGrath is named on the IRFU twitter etc. They must've been dead certain KM was going to get the nod.

Can't agree with the exclusion of some players, but can't say I'm surprised.