Ireland U20s hoping mixture of brain and brawn a winning formula ahead of Wales trip

Richie Murphy’s side kick off their tournament in Colwyn Bay on Friday evening.

Brian Gleeson in full flow during Ireland U20s training in Dublin this week. Picture: INPHO/Ben Brady

Size isn’t everything in rugby but it sure helps. That holds even more at the U20 grade where players are still fitting in to frames that may not be fully formed and Ireland have rarely found themselves trading in such excess bulk.

Six Nations campaigns at this level are usually prefaced with the physical disadvantage the boys in green will face when up against France and England but this crop is different. Bigger. Badder? We’ll see. Better? Well, last year’s crop did claim a Grand Slam.

Sam Prendergast is Richie Murphy’s starting ten on Friday evening and even he stands 6’ 4”. The pack itself is said to be one of the biggest ever to represent the country in this tournament and it includes Munster’s Brian Gleeson at No.8.

“It’s good to have a pack like that in front of me. It makes everyone’s job easier. As well as being big lads we’re all very good ball players. It is not like we’re relying on our size, we’re very good technical rugby players and all switched on. We’re well able to carry out the game plan.” That combination of brain and brawn should work to their advantage in North Wales when they face a side that, by its own coach’s admission, is light on experience in the front five when it comes to this grade of rugby.

Ireland have been stressing the point that they have won just once in Colwyn Bay in the ten years since Wales relocated there for the U20s grade but that’s a statistic twisted to a particular narrative if ever there was one.

The last meeting there resulted in a nine-point Irish win, in 2019, and the visitors hammered Wales 40-12 in Cardiff two years ago when the entire Championship was shifted to the Arms Park due to Covid.

For Gleeson, this is just the latest of steps down the path towards a pro rugby career that looked to have come to an end when he stopped playing with Thurles RFC as a nine- or ten-year old.

A Loughmore-Castleiney clubman, he was always going to have his head turned by the small ball – and the big. He was good enough to represent Tipperary at U14 and U15 but rugby had already elbowed back into the picture by then.

Rockwell College didn’t offer much in terms of sporting options beyond the oval code and Gleeson prospered after playing his first game for the school in the front row and persuading his coach Martin Daly to shunt him backwards.

Denis Leamy was the coach when Gleeson claimed a Junior Cup title with the school and he has since moved up the ladder from Munster U17s and U19s to the Ireland 20s where he is starting despite having another year underage at the grade in 2024.

That’s a good sign.

Everything speeds up for players at this point. The crowds are bigger and the TV cameras leave little room to hide when things begin to go wrong. The flip side to that is the boost it can give at such a crucial juncture in a career.

“Naturally nerves will settle in as we go on through the week,” Gleeson explained a few days ago. “It’s about keeping our heads screwed on, keeping our focus, trying not to think about the game.

“We’re building, going over different plays and how we can break Wales down. We have to take confidence from our own game, know that if we play as well as we can we have a good shot over there.” 

Wales U20s: C Winnett; L Morgan, L Hennessy, H Ackerman, H Houston; D Edwards, A Hughes; D Kelleher-Griffiths, S Scarfe, T Pritchard; L Edwards, J Green; R Woodman, L Giannini, H Davies.

Ireland U20s: J Nicholson (UCD/Leinster); I Anagu (La Rochelle/IQ Rugby), H Cooney (Clontarf/Leinster), J Devine (Corinthians/Connacht), H Gavin (Galwegians/Connacht); S Prendergast (Lansdowne/Leinster), F Gunne (Terenure/Leinster); G Hadden (Clontarf/Leinster), G McCarthy (UCD/Leinster), P McCarthy (DUFC/Leinster); D Mangan (UCD/Leinster), C O’Tighernaigh (UCD/Leinster); J McNabney (Ballymena/Ulster), R Quinn (Old Crescent/Munster), B Gleeson (Garryowen/Munster).

Referee: L Ramos (France).