The 'type of anxiety' surrounding Ireland ahead of final warm-up
Ireland captain Iain Henderson has urged his country's Rugby World Cup hopefuls to set aside any lingering anxiety about selection and play their way into Andy Farrell’s final squad.
Head coach Farrell will reveal his 33-man group for the tournament on Sunday afternoon in Dublin, having decided to bring forward the announcement by 24 hours.
Players have one final chance to secure a return ticket to France during Saturday evening’s warm-up clash with Samoa in Bayonne, with six set to suffer disappointment.
Ulster lock Henderson, who is preparing for his third World Cup, admits tension has increased in camp ahead of the looming cut. “Close to half the squad haven’t been in this position before,” said the 31-year-old.
“What the players are focusing on is how they are going to put their best foot forward for Andy to get a good glimpse of them. He knows each one of us pretty intimately at this stage and I feel that the final step that the players can take is to actually go out and show it again in the Test match this weekend.
“There is a type of anxiety there but the players are well used to being put in sticky situations, selections for cup finals, selections for tours, selections for Six Nations games. Obviously, this one carries a slightly different weight but we are a really tight-knit group, the guys who are feeling probably the worst about it are probably the best supported.”
Farrell has regularly insisted all 33 places in his squad remain up for grabs. Yet, in reality, only a few spots appear undecided, leaving a handful of peripheral players battling it out. It is unclear whether the Englishman will go for a 19/14 split of forwards and backs, or opt for 18/15.
The former would likely mean Stuart McCloskey and Keith Earls, who are set to start against Samoa at Stade Jean Dauger, and Jacob Stockdale and Ciaran Frawley, who will not be involved, are competing for one spot.
Hookers Dan Sheehan and Ronan Kelleher, number eight Jack Conan and prop Dave Kilcoyne each have injury problems, albeit Farrell has been upbeat on those issues.
“Everyone is looking after each other and ensuring whoever is left out will feel as little left out as possible,” said Henderson. “I feel that the guys really do look out for each other and there is a genuine care for how each other is feeling.”
Ireland’s World Cup campaign starts against Romania on September 9 in Bordeaux. Their weekend clash with Samoa is the first meeting between the sides since the Irish won 47-5 at the 2019 tournament in Japan.
“This is their pre-World Cup campaign, similar to ours, coming to a crescendo,” said Henderson. “It’s an exciting time for them, looking to have a shot at us.
"We are looking to play the game we like to play. They pose huge threats, they are definitely a different animal from the last time we played them.”
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Andy Goode just loves to be controversial. Its boring. Let’s all stop reading.
Go to commentsYou have got to consider that if the situation was flipped and the French were held to a salary cap with no English equivalent, the English would laugh in their faces and tell them to get over it. As for Leinster (as a fan), the central contract system is a dream but is guilty of cutting out the other 3 provinces. At the end of the day, it comes across outside of the English border that the Premiership is drowning and trying to take everyone else with it rather than adapt. The English lose, the English want new rules. We've seen this repeat (and once it even led to the current Champions Cup) You make many good and informed points, but if the flip was on the other flop, it wouldn't be Rugby’s problem I suspect - it would be a French one.
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