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Ireland cut five players ahead of August 28 RWC squad announcement
By Liam Heagney
Andy Farrell has trimmed his Ireland squad ahead of the upcoming August 28 confirmation of the 33 he will take with him to the Rugby World Cup. The 2023 Six Nations Grand Slam champions had been training with an original 42-strong squad that was recently increased with the addition of an extra prop.
However, ahead of this Saturday’s Summer Nations Series match versus England in Dublin, Farrell has now opted to reduce his World Cup options by five, excluding two forwards and three backs.
A statement read: “The Ireland management has confirmed that five players will now return to their provinces to continue their pre-season training programmes. They are Caolin Blade, Gavin Coombes, Calvin Nash, Jamie Osborne and Kieran Treadwell.
“With Munster prop Jeremy Loughman having been added to the squad this week, this means that there are now 38 players in training. The final 33-man Ireland squad for Rugby World Cup 2023 will be announced on Monday, August 28.”
After taking on England, the world No1-ranked Ireland have one final warm-up fixture, their August 26 meeting with Samoa in Bayonne, behind naming their 33 for an RWC campaign that begins in Bordeaux on September 9 versus Romania and also features pool matches against Tonga, South Africa and Scotland.
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Latest Comments
Galthie’s behaviour in the last few weeks has had a chilling effect on the officials in Paris on Saturday. He was able to attack the citing commission, the officiating (no direct attack on individuals, he left that to FFR head). It started with his disinformation campaign about the Ntamack versus Ringrose ban. Media, rugby sites and pods have a lot of culpability for allowing Galthie’s BS to go a couple of times around the world before bother to reading the written decision and why both cases were very different re club matches counting. They might have also pointed out that up until then France had more citings under Galthie and favourable decisions under the commission than all other 6 Nations combined.
We can’t situation where coaches can tie up and outrage the rugby world with clickbait outrage without the rugby world bothering to check if it has substance. We saw the result on Saturday. If any nation should be complaining about injustice its Scotland NOT France.
Go to commentsCane and McCaw didn’t jump in the lineout. The argument doesn’t make sense. Kirifi can bring things to the mix, that’s undeniable. He’s very combative, a real pest in the rucks, and he repeats the efforts. He’s a bundle of energy.
Besides, I don’t see how the careers of Blackadder, Jacobson, and Papalii in the All Blacks demonstrate that they are more indispensable at the moment?
Kirifi needs to be tested. And even if he might not be considered an automatic starter, he would be a good squad player. For 2027, I imagine a back row of Frizell/Savea/Sititi. Sititi at 7."
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