Match preview: Another patchy display won't do, Ireland must be close to perfect

Ireland may be three wins from three but have yet to put in a consistent performance across 80 minutes

Skipper Caelan Doris during the Ireland Captain's Run at Aviva Stadium. Pic: Ben Brady, Inpho

Always on and ever ready, across the board. That is what is expected of Ireland at Aviva Stadium on Saturday afternoon as their Guinness Six Nations dominance faces its toughest examination to date.

A meeting with France has been the defining fixture of this historic championship in each of the last three seasons and so it will be in 2025 with Ireland chasing a first three-peat of titles that will make them ground-breakers in the Six Nations pantheon. Beat the French in Dublin and a second Grand Slam in three years becomes very much a possibility with Italy their remaining opponents in Rome seven days later.

Plenty at stake then, and with the added layer of emotion that the final home Tests for a trio of Irish centurions, Peter O’Mahony, Conor Murray and Cian Healy, bring to the occasion, a potentially difficult tightrope for Caelan Doris’s side to walk. Yet the real challenge is a France side capable of producing rugby no other team can match, as it showed when putting Italy to the sword at Stadio Olimpico last time out, rebounding from a surprise one-point defeat in England by running in 11 tries to beat Italy 73-24.

Captain Doris acknowledged on Friday that Ireland will have to be pretty close to perfect if they are to pass the test lying before them. They may be three wins from three but have yet to put in a consistent performance across 80 minutes in seeing off England, Scotland and Wales to collect the Triple Crown and that is what will be needed if they are to complete a hat-trick of wins over Les Bleus this time around.

"France are strong in attack but defensively as well,” Doris said. “So our attack is going to have to go up a level. There's probably an awareness that they will score so we're going to need to score tries as well but you've got to be on it defensively with the way they can create something from nothing.

“They can attack from their 22 and go the full length. They can pick through a breakdown and they're gone straight away, their offloading ability, everything. So you've got to be always on and we're expecting high ball in play again.

“They've got a threat through their scrum, through their lineout maul as well so it really is a full across-the-board performance that's required."

Champions Cup rivals Leinster and Toulouse played out a nail-biting final at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium last May, Antoine Dupont lifting the trophy in north London after extra-time in a match featuring 10 Toulousains and 14 of Ireland’s matchday 23 in this weekend’s Test, including Doris.

“One of the big learnings from that game was our breakdown,” the Ireland captain said. “Well, first of all, being clinical when we got entry into the 22, there's a few we left out there in the first half in that game.

“But the breakdown, I mean, Antoine Dupont got four turnovers, so that's a threat that's coming tomorrow as well, expecting quite a bit of disruption around the breakdown, but yeah, taking our chances and also the awareness that it's going to be an 80-minute game and regardless of where the score is at, they'll keep fighting and we have to do the same.” 

Interim Ireland head coach Simon Easterby also addressed the need for consistency from first minute to last having allowed all three of their previous Six Nations opponents to enjoy prolonged periods of applying pressure.

“There's been different elements of the game where we've won and lost momentum,” Easterby said. “I guess our challenge is to try and build as much momentum and build big moments on big moments on big moments.

“That's when you start to get the return, the reward. But there have been lots of areas in every game where you feel we could have done better than and we've let momentum slip.

“That's a continuous challenge for any team, and this one as well. We want to feel like we can go and dominate sides but you've got to be really consistent in what you do and in making sure you don't allow them access into the game as well.” 

The Ireland boss added: “Mental fitness is really important, having the ability to stay in the game continuously until there's a break in play and then you get that chance to take a breath. Likewise for them against us, they'll feel the same probably with Jamison (Gibson-Park) that they'll have to be on it all the time and there's no difference for us against someone like Antoine Dupont.” 

Easterby’s last point sums up why this contest is so intriguing. Having beaten France home and away in the last two seasons, Ireland are a team Dupont and company have to be wary of themselves and the Irish can finally deliver that complete performance their improving form across the 2025 championship suggests is just around the corner, then home advantage can help translate that into a yet another title-defining victory.

IRELAND: H Keenan (Leinster); J Osborne (Leinster), R Henshaw (Leinster), B Aki (Connacht), J Lowe (Leinster); S Prendergast (Leinster), J Gibson-Park (Leinster); A Porter (Leinster), D Sheehan (Leinster), F Bealham (Connacht); J McCarthy (Leinster), T Beirne (Munster); P O’Mahony (Munster), J van der Flier (Leinster), C Doris (Leinster) - captain.

Replacements: R Herring Ulster), C Healy (Leinster), T Clarkson (Leinster), J Ryan (Leinster), J Conan (Leinster), R Baird (Leinster), C Murray (Munster), J Crowley (Munster).

FRANCE: T Ramos (Toulouse); D Penaud (Bordeaux), P-L Barassi (Toulouse), Y Moefana (Bordeaux), L Bielle-Biarrey (Bordeaux); R Ntamack (Toulouse), A Dupont (Toulouse); J-B Gros (Toulon), P Mauvaka (Toulouse), U Atonio (La Rochelle); T Flament (Toulouse), M Guillard (Lyon); F Cros (Toulouse), P Boudehent (La Rochelle), G Alldritt (La Rochelle).

Replacements: J Marchand (Toulouse), C Baille (Toulouse), D Aldegheri (Toulouse), E Meafou (Toulouse), H Auradou (Pau), O Jegou (La Rochelle), A Jelonch (Toulouse), M Lucu (Bordeaux).

Referee: Angus Gardner (Australia)