Joe Schmidt ‘open-minded’ on selection after defeat
Ireland rugby head coach, Joe Schmidt, has put his front-line stars under pressure ahead of the Test against Wales, in Cardiff, this Saturday. He says his World Cup selection process is still wide-open.
In the 57-15 defeat to England, at Twickenham on Saturday, a number of returning first-team regulars wilted in the London sun and were overpowered by Eddie Jones’s side in an eight-try to two hammering. Schmidt may have to readdress his 31-man squad for next month’s World Cup in Japan.
Players not selected at the weekend now have an opportunity to impress this weekend at the Principality Stadium. Johnny Sexton, Robbie Henshaw, Keith Earls, and James Ryan are possible starters this Saturday, having not featured in Ireland’s opening two summer fixtures. Others in the 40-man training squad champing at the bit for game time include Dave Kilcoyne and Jack Conan.
For those who played in the Twickenham debacle, the post-match review will be painful.
“Yeah, we have to be open-minded,” Schmidt said.
“I think Eddie’s selection is open-minded. He’s put some guys in there who hadn’t really, formally been that involved in the England set-up. So, for us, we’ll be looking hard and long (and it’s not going to be pleasant) at the footage, and trying to piece together who has stood up and deserves to be in the 31 and who’s under pressure.”
The performance against England will not cause a kneejerk reaction to selection for Cardiff, though, Schmidt said. “Not really. We gave a couple of guys and opportunity today. Guys who haven’t had a lot of time with us and we’ll do the same next week.
“We’ve got a couple of guys who will come in and bring a big of energy next week and we’re looking forward to that. It will keep a bit of pressure on some of the guys who didn’t go as well as they would have liked today.
“We will bring a few in next, for sure. There’s probably one or two that we might bring in again for the final weekend (against Wales, in Dublin, on September 7), so we have a little bit of a plan.
“Some guys are operating on a pre-season that is just coming to a close and then they’ll freshen up and get into the game next week or the week after, depending on how we feel they’re going.
“We certainly need to hit the ground running against Scotland, so we can’t afford to be mixing and matching too much right now.”
Ireland had one injury concern from Saturday. Loosehead prop Coan Healy hobbled off before half-time, but the diagnosis was a sprain. “So we’re hopeful. He walked from the pitch, so we’re hopeful that he’ll be okay,” Schmidt said.
Conor Murray passed a head injury assessment and briefly returned to the field before half-time, but did not reappear for the second half.
“We had a bit of a breakdown in our communications and he wasn’t actually meant to go back out before half-time,” Schmidt said.
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