Jamison Gibson-Park: 'I'm excited to see what Prendergast and Crowley do for years to come'

The battle for the number 10 jersey is the chief issue facing temporary boss Simon Easterby in the absence of British & Irish Lions head coach Andy Farrell and it will be decided by the tightest of margins

Ireland Rugby Press Conference, The Campus, Quinta do Lago, Portugal 28/1/2025

While Ireland supporters await the identity of the fly-half who will lead their team into the 2025 Guinness Six Nations, interim head coach Simon Easterby has several other selection issues to ponder ahead of Thursday afternoon team announcement.

The battle for the number 10 jersey between its newest incumbent Sam Prendergast and its previous owner Jack Crowley is the chief issue facing the temporary boss in the absence of British & Irish Lions head coach Andy Farrell and it will be decided by the tightest of margins.

Prendergast appears to be favourite to start having been preferred to Crowley for the autumn’s final Test two months ago against Australia in just his third Ireland appearance following a debut off the bench a fortnight earlier.

Crowley rebounded admirably from that decision to close the game out for a win over the Wallabies and his recent form in the Champions Cup has been a powerful reminder of his playmaking talents yet Prendergast has simultaneously looked comfortable starting for Leinster against Munster on December 27, La Rochelle a fortnight later and then Bath, all of them victories.

Dan Sheehan’s impressive return from a six-month injury absence for Leinster last weekend may prompt an immediate recall as starting hooker but the more likely scenario is for Ronan Kellher to continue his November partnership with props Andrew Porter and Finlay Bealham, set to continue at tighthead after Tadhg Furlong’s recurrence of a calf injury that sidelined him during November.

The Autumn Nations Series back five of Ireland scrum could see change, however, with Joe McCarthy, and James Ryan having been the starting locks in front of flankers Tadhg Beirne and Josh van Flier and No.8 and captain Caelan Doris.

There have been strong hints that a reshuffle could see Beirne switch from blindside to second row, with Ryan Baird, or Jack Conan, handed the number six jersey alongside in-form Leinster team-mates van der Flier and Doris.

All of which would make for a powerful bench with Sheehan, McCarthy, Conan and Crowley among the potential replacements.

Sam Prendergast and teammate Jack Crowley will be battling it out for the number 10 jersey. 

Whichever of the 10s gets the nod from Easterby on Thursday afternoon, their scrum-half partner Jamison Gibson-Park is confident they will pack a pretty impactful one-two punch against the English.

“They’re pretty similar characters and in many ways their games are pretty similar as well,” Gibson-Park said. “It’s pretty awesome to have such competition and getting cracks at each other, obviously we didn’t get it at Christmas time (when Crowley was rested for the Munster v Leinster URC clash) but I think it’s great for them, and they’re both going to be unbelievable players, so I’m excited to watch that down the years.” 

Gibson-Park is also happy to begin the championship with new law trials protecting number nines having bedded in since November. While Beirne this week reiterated his stance that scrum-halves were being over-protected after being given greater breathing space at the base of rucks, his team-mate understandably saw it differently.

“I can see what they’re trying to do,” Gibson-Park said, “they want a cleaner, faster game so I think it certainly makes sense from that point of view. I don’t mind it. I feel the forwards probably have a different opinion but it’s kind of the way the game is going.” 

That protection also means nines cannot be as aggressive on closing down their opposite numbers after they have fed the ball into the scrum.

“Yeah, that’s one of the tricky ones,” the Ireland half-back said. “We’re probably one of the teams that would have tried to take advantage of being able to go and put pressure on the base so that’s gone now, obviously we’ve had to rethink our set-ups and that. That’s all part of the evolution of the game. We’ve got a few clever guys who are in charge of us and that helps, and Hugo Keenan and stuff, so he’s got a few bits for us.

“There has been a few chats around the provinces and coming in here, I think Si has got a bit more to show us tomorrow. It’s important isn’t it to be able to get on the front foot and I suppose exploit these kind of rules in the game. We’ve got a little bit more work to do on it but hopefully we’ll be able to take advantage.” 

The Ireland scrum-half is adamant his side will have to be more vigilant against England’s plans to shut down their multi-phase play and apply pressure through their counter-attack from Irish tactical kicking, as they did successfully in ending the bid for back-to-back Grand Slams at Twickenham last March.

“They probably caught us on the hop but we stuck in that game and it wasn’t like they ran away from us at all. We can certainly be better, you’ve got to go into it with an open mind and they might come with a different game plan again, we have to be ready for anything really.”