O’Gara gets the nod again to start in the Rugby World Cup quarter-final against Wales at Wellington Regional Stadium, having seen off Sexton for the starting spot against Italy he’s done it again. Kidney has brushed aside concerns that Wales will target O’Gara’s defensive capabilities.
Rory Best will under a late fitness test on a shoulder injury he picked up against Italy with Sean Cronin waiting in the wings. The teams have to be in 48 hours before kick-off and Kidney says he may make that call as late as the last minute! If Cronin is promoted to the starting line-up then Damien Varley would be promoted to the bench. Otherwise the pack is unchanged.
IRELAND Team & Replacements (v Wales, 2011 Rugby World Cup quarter-final, Wellington Regional Stadium, Saturday, October 8, kick-off 6pm local time/6am Irish time):
15 - Rob Kearney (UCD/Leinster) 14 - Tommy Bowe (Ospreys) 13 - Brian O’Driscoll (UCD/Leinster) (capt) 12 - Gordon D’Arcy (Lansdowne/Leinster) 11 - Keith Earls (Young Munster/Munster) 10 - Ronan O’Gara (Cork Constitution/Munster) 9 - Conor Murray (Garryowen/Munster) 1 - Cian Healy (Clontarf/Leinster) 2 - Rory Best (Banbridge/Ulster)/Sean Cronin (Leinster) 3 - Mike Ross (Clontarf/Leinster) 4 - Donncha O’Callaghan (Cork Constitution/Munster) 5 - Paul O’Connell (Young Munster/Munster) 6 - Stephen Ferris (Dungannon/Ulster) 7 - Sean O’Brien (Clontarf/Leinster) 8 - Jamie Heaslip (Naas/Leinster)
Replacements:
16 - Sean Cronin (Leinster)/Damien Varley (Garryowen/Munster) 17 - Tom Court (Malone/Ulster) 18 - Donnacha Ryan (Shannon/Munster) 19 - Denis Leamy (Cork Constitution/Munster) 20 - Eoin Reddan (Lansdowne/Leinster) 21 - Jonathan Sexton (St. Mary’s College/Leinster) 22 - Andrew Trimble (Ballymena/Ulster)
A 30 point victory over Italy, and France’s shock defeat to Tonga mean Ireland have moved into fifth place in the IRB Rankings.
Tonga’s reward for one of the biggest upsets in Rugby World Cup history sees them make a massive leap in the rankings, meaning they now sit one below France who have dropped below Ireland, Wales and Argentina to eighth (the lowest position they’ve occupied!).
IRB WORLD RANKINGS (as of Monday, October 3):
Last week’s positions in brackets -
1(1) NEW ZEALAND 90.62 rating points 2(2) SOUTH AFRICA 86.71 3(3) AUSTRALIA 84.84 4(4) ENGLAND 84.54 5(6) IRELAND 83.14 6(7) WALES 80.73 7(8) ARGENTINA 80.28 8(5) FRANCE 79.72 9(13) TONGA 76.63 10(9) SCOTLAND 76.20
Three tries in the second half saw Ireland through to the quarter finals of the Rugby World Cup 2011 as Pool C winners!
O’Driscoll’s 45th try moved Ireland to 17-9 in the second half and with players all stepping up tot he mark the space was created for Keith Earls to celebrate his 24th birthday with two-tries. O’Gara added four penalties and two conversion to take his points tally to 16. Sexton on as a replacement for O’Gara also added a conversion and a penalty.
A front row of Healy, Best and Ross was more than a match for the expected struggle in the scrum and the back row of O’Brien, Ferris and Heaslip were dominant throughout.
The unlucky player of the night was Tommy Bowe, who had a first half try disallowed and went so very close to scoring in a frenzied second half!
Nobody really cares which way Ireland do it, all of the above work as results on Sunday which would see Ireland go through to the knockout stages. The euphoria of that win over Australia is over, it’s time to knuckle down. We always knew that the Australia game would be a challenge, but really it was always going to come down to the game against Italy.
Italy know what they have to do, they plan on dominating the scrum and not letting Ireland play a running game. We’ve heard this talk before but this time (despite all the pre-match chatter), Kidney is aware that Italy could do this.
Experience comes in the form of O’Gara at fly-half, the playmaker will be expected to control the game, but Kidney has sprung a surprise by offering Conor Murray only his second international start at scrum-half
O’Driscoll who sat out the Russia game, will return to captain the team and he has absolute faith in Murray:
“He’s new but he’s dealing with it extremely well. He’s a confident young man, very much in his depth in the surroundings and you wouldn’t know he has a handful, not even a handful, of Tests under his belt.”
The pack is unchanged from the team that beat Australia, although O’Connell will undergo a late test on his hamstring. Leo Cullen who captain the win over Russia will be on standby to step in.
Andrea Masi returns to the Italy side after a calf muscle injury forced his late withdrawal from their win over the United States (McLean drops to the bench to make way for Masi).
IRELAND Team & Replacements (v Italy, 2011 Rugby World Cup Pool C, Otago Stadium, Sunday, October 2, kick-off 8.30pm local time/8.30am Irish time):
15 - Rob Kearney (UCD/Leinster) 14 - Tommy Bowe (Ospreys) 13 - Brian O’Driscoll (UCD/Leinster) (capt) 12 - Gordon D’Arcy (Lansdowne/Leinster) 11 - Keith Earls (Young Munster/Munster) 10 - Ronan O’Gara (Cork Constitution/Munster) 9 - Conor Murray (Garryowen/Munster) 1 - Cian Healy (Clontarf/Leinster) 2 - Rory Best (Banbridge/Ulster) 3 - Mike Ross (Clontarf/Leinster) 4 - Donncha O’Callaghan (Cork Constitution/Munster) 5 - Paul O’Connell (Young Munster/Munster) 6 - Stephen Ferris (Dungannon/Ulster) 7 - Sean O’Brien (Clontarf/Leinster) 8 - Jamie Heaslip (Naas/Leinster)
Replacements:
16 - Sean Cronin (Leinster) 17 - Tom Court (Malone/Ulster) 18 - Donnacha Ryan (Shannon/Munster) 19 - Denis Leamy (Cork Constitution/Munster) 20 - Eoin Reddan (Lansdowne/Leinster) 21 - Jonathan Sexton (St. Mary’s College/Leinster) 22 - Andrew Trimble (Ballymena/Ulster)
Italy team
Andrea Masi; Tommaso Benvenuti, Gonzalo Canale, Gonzalo Garcia, Mirco Bergamasco; Luciano Orquera, Fabio Semenzato; Sergio Parisse (captain), Mauro Bergamasco, Alessandro Zanni, Cornelius van Zyl, Quintin Geldenhuys, Martin Castrogiovanni, Leonardo Ghiraldini, Salvatore Perugini. Reserves: Fabio Ongaro, Andrea Lo Cicero, Marco Bortolami, Paul Derbyshire, Edoardo Gori, Riccardo Bocchino, Luke McLean.
Paul O’Connell is Ireland’s biggest concern ahead of the game against Italy in Pool D on Sunday. The Lions captain picked up a hamstring injury in his superb performance against Australia last week.
Whoever loses the Pool D clash faces a trip home, but that won’t force the Ireland management’s hand into risking O’Connell. If Ireland win there’s likely to be a quarter final against Wales and possibly more…
O’Connell has resumed running and hopes to make a return to training tomorrow.
Conor Murray and Ronan O’Gara ran through the session with most of the front-liners suggesting that they will start ahead of Sexton and Reddan. Trimble is also pushing for a starting place but you would expect the team to remain largely unchanged from the starting lineup against Australia.
Sunday’s World Cup clash between Ireland and Italy turned into a war of words yesterday, sparked by Italian coach Nick Mallett writing off the Irish scrum. In retaliation, Ireland full-back Rob Kearney called on the team to take the Italian remarks “personally”.
Italy must beat Ireland to reach the quarter-finals following the bonus-point they secured in beating the USA 27-10 yesterday while a win for the Irish would see them top the pool.
After three wins, Ireland are on 13 points in Pool C, with Italy and Australia certain to pick up five points against the Russians on Saturday on 10. This means that should Italy win, even a losing bonus point would not save the Irish from a pool exit, as the result between the two sides would become the deciding factor.
After seeing a brave American challenge destroyed by the power of the Italian scrum yesterday, Mallett is confidently predicting a similar outcome when they meet Ireland this weekend.
“Our main advantage is our scrum and we dominated them (the USA) completely,” he said.
“Ireland dominated Australia physically but we know perfectly well that we’ve got a better front row than Ireland, and we’re going to go in there to prove that. I’m hoping that (Martin) Castrogiovanni, Leonardo (Ghiraldini) and Salvatore (Perugini) can put us on the front foot.”
Kearney has urged Ireland to take Italy’s over-confidence personally and use it as an extra bit of motivation for the pool decider.
“We were bloody lucky to beat them in February,” said Kearney.
“We probably didn’t deserve to win that game. We know this is the game that they’re targeting. The Irish is the one game they feel they can cause an upset and spoil the party so we have to take that a little bit personally.”
Ireland’s Geordan Murphy and Italy’s Martin Castrogiovanni and are Leicester team mates and co-owners of an Italian restaurant business partners so, with their nations due to clash in the World Cup on Sunday, they have been doing their very best to wind each other up.
“He’s been texting me. The closer the game gets, I’m receiving more and more text messages from him,” said Murphy. He swears a lot at me in Italian and he’s trying to teach me all the bad words. I’m not going to repeat them.”
The lean Murphy takes a playful swipe at his giant friend’s appetite for food. “I’m thinking of leaving some baskets of chips in the corners. That should do it. The amount he eats, it should distract him quite nicely. If you look at the shape of both of us, I tend to drink a lot of water and he tends to eat a lot of the food.”
On a more serious note, Ireland are well aware of the threat posed by Castrogiovanni, who was pivotal during Italy’s front-row demolition of the United States on Tuesday.
“He’s a good mate of mine, he’s a fantastic prop and he’s a different character off the field to what he is on it,” said Murphy. “He’s certainly one of Italy’s key players.”
Ireland go into the game knowing a draw or better would guarantee top spot in the group while a win for Italy may still be insufficient for them to reach their first World Cup quarter-final.
Ireland have won the last 15 meetings between the two but needed a dramatic late drop goal from Ronan O’Gara to scramble a 13-11 victory in Rome during the Six Nations earlier this year. Murphy knows that they need to be on their guard against a vastly improved Italian side.
“They’ve improved massively over the years, they are a serious side, they’re a very physical side but they’re playing some good football alongside that now and are scoring some good tries,” said Murphy. “It’s the biggest game of the pool, they’ve said they are targeting it,” he added.
“They will raise their intensity from the Six Nations. It’s the World Cup, it’s a level up and I’m sure the game will reflect that. Our backs will be against the wall as much as theirs will.” The good form of a fit-again Rob Kearney may deny Murphy a place in the starting line up.
“Italy have pulled out some famous victories in the last few years. Hopefully on Sunday it won’t be our turn to be on the wrong end of a result,” said Keith Earls in an interview today as the Irishmen gear up for the match against Italy in Sunday’s Rugby World Cup match.
This afternoon, Ireland trained at the Carisbrook Stadium, notoriously known as the ‘House of Pain,’ as part of the squad’s preparation for their biggest match to-date in the World Cup. Following the USA’s last minute defeat to Italy and thanks to a bonus point in the dying minutes of the match, Ireland are on the brink of losing any chance to advance.
But Coach Declan Kidney and his team have prepared for it. Lose or win, the squad promises to play even more passionate, strategic and, if necessary, physical rugby. Way before matches commenced and right after the draw, Kidney, Earls, and the rest of the team knew that with Italy in the same pool, advancing to the semi finals would be darn too difficult.
“Italy ran us close (13-11) and beat France in the Six Nations so it’s going to be tough,” said Earls today. “It’s always been tough against Italian sides – I remember even at under-20 level they were really physical”.
Ireland still have concerns over Earls, Rob Kearney, Sean O’Brien, Tommy Bowe and Paul O’Connell who are currently battling out injuries. On the brighter side, Gordon D’Arcy has now fully recovered from a hamstring injury.
Meanwhile, Italy coach Nick Mallet knows his team has a better chance of winning Sunday’s match.
“We know perfectly well we have a better front row than Ireland and we’re hoping to prove that on Saturday. If our front row put us on the front foot, we can win the game,” Mallett said in a separate interview.
Since 1997, Ireland have pulled off 15 successive victories over Italy. In February, the Italian Azzuri lost only in a tight match, 13-11, thanks to Ronan O’Gara’s late drop-goal at the Six Nations.
When it comes to the biggest tournament in World Rugby do you put your trust in an experienced fly-half or gamble on the boldness of youth? That is the dilemma facing all four home nations with a potential knockout contest in their final group matches this weekend.
England must choose between Jonny Wilkinson and Toby Flood; Ireland between Ronan O’Gara or Jonathan Sexton; Wales have a fit-again Stephen Jones to challenge Rhys Priestland; and Scotland will have to decide between Dan Parks and Ruaridh Jackson.
Wilkinson, O’Gara, Jones and Parks are all in their 30s, the first three all veterans of more than one Lions campaign. Wilkinson and O’Gara have accumulated more than 1,000 points in international rugby and Jones passed 900 for Wales against Namibia.
Wilkinson, O’Gara and Parks are all drop goal experts, even if the latter was at fault in the final minutes against Argentina last Sunday, hustled on to his weaker left foot. They, along with Jones, are all controllers, unlikely to make a line-splitting break, not the quickest but generally cool under pressure. Between them, they have dropped 72 goals in Test rugby.
Flood, Sexton, Priestland and Jackson are more than playmakers, all offering a threat with the ball in hand and test back rows, but they can also be a little volatile. Flood was outstanding in the first half of England’s Test programme last season, running rather than kicking and bypassing the static midfield he had been handed to bring his back three into play. As teams adjusted to England’s strategy, Flood struggled to react and he ended the Six Nation in Dublin trying in vain to inspire a running game when the conditions, and the rampant Irish pack, demanded that he take a more pragmatic approach and put his side in decent positions.
Wilkinson started England’s first World Cup warm-up against Wales at Twickenham last month and played much the same way as he does for Toulon, standing flat or deep, and reacting to what was in front of him. Against Argentina in the opening round he seemed almost unsure of his role. His best years for England came when he had a footballing brain outside him, particularly Will Greenwood and Mike Catt. His strength has been execution rather than decision-making itself, but with England now preferring size in midfield there are times when he is exposed.
His chief asset has always been his goal-kicking. He has the ability to detach himself from time and circumstance, blotting out everything around him as if he is on the training field. His accuracy has dropped this tournament, with England questioning the balls being used and whether they are all properly inflated. Wilkinson struggled in the closed stadium in Dunedin, but if there is one player you would want on your side for a kick to win a match, Wilkinson would still be at the top of the list along with O’Gara and South Africa’s Morne Steyn.
Given the cut-throat nature of England’s final pool game against Scotland, together with his selection against the Pumas, Wilkinson would seem the more likely starter, but have England been running from everywhere against Georgia and Romania for the sake of it? Will they back themselves to take the game to Scotland and create space?
The New Zealand full-back Israel Dagg and the wing Cory Jane have been feted here for their performances in the World Cup, but are they better than Ben Foden and Chris Ashton, or do they receive more opportunities and profit from an off-loading game while England’s ball-carriers tend to go to ground?
The Ireland coach Declan Kidney has come to prefer Sexton to O’Gara, using the latter to come off the bench in the final 20-30 minutes to apply the finishing touch, as he did against Australia. Sexton is not only a more dangerous runner than O’Gara, he also offers more resistance in defence.
Ireland may have battled their way to victory over Australia, but Sexton showed for Leinster in the Heineken Cup final against Northampton last May, when they were chasing the game in the second half, the very clear threat he poses in attack, both as a runner and as a distributor. Italy will want to draw Ireland into an arm-wrestle on Sunday, as they did Australia for 50 minutes before the Wallaby backs cut loose. Kidney’s ploy has been to start with Sexton, build a lead and then bring on O’Gara to manage it.
The prospect of Priestland starting a World Cup match for Wales at fly-half initially seemed remote as he looked to have been chosen to provide cover at full-back. However, Coach Warren Gatland could see Priestland playing at 10 in the tournament with James Hook at full-back. When Jones suffered a calf strain during the warm-up at Twickenham, Priestland was moved from full-back to fly-half and he was so assured in that position that he has been the first choice in the position in the World Cup. Jones is now fit again but with ground to make up. Wales may have virtually secured their place in the last eight by the time they meet Fiji on Sunday. If Samoa get nothing out of Friday’s tussle with South Africa, the Fijians would need to beat Wales by a margin of 62 points to make the last eight.
Scotland’s equation is simple: beat England and make up four points on them in the table, and hope that Argentina either lose to Georgia or beat them with a try bonus point. Their coach Andy Robinson started with Jackson against Argentina, a bold decision given both the opposition and the likely weather. Parks came on in the second period and Scotland looked in control until the final six minutes. They have now gone two matches without scoring a try and they will target the breakdown against England, looking to force penalties from one of the least disciplined teams in the tournament.
Scotland’s selection at fly-half is allied to the full-back position: Jackson and Paterson or Parks and Rory Lamont with goal-kicking in mind. Whatever combination is chosen, field position will be key on Saturday night.
At this stage of the tournament one mistake can put you and your team on the next flight home. All four home unions have a choice to make in the fly-half position, but will they choose to be safe from the start, using the bench if they need to play catch-up, or go for it and use the replacement to close out a game?
It may be England v Scotland and Italy v Ireland, but it is not the Six Nations. It is like the final round of a Heineken Cup group, which could just give England and Ireland a significant advantage.
