Steady as she goes.
Perhaps above all else, the composition of Ireland’s 34-man squad for the forthcoming 2024 Guinness Six Nations confirms how much this championship is a standalone tournament in its own right. Hence this squad constitutes more of a continuation from the World Cup than a new four-year cycle.
There are many reasons for this. Uppermost among them is that, as he demonstrated in the last four-year cycle, Andy Farrell is more a believer in two-year countdowns to a World Cup, and in any event his priority is to win back-to-back Six Nations for only the third time in Irish rugby history.
Nor have the IRFU ever hidden the importance of this competition in the overall scheme of things, and not least toward funding the game on this island. The Irish men’s 15s team is the lifeblood of the game. The union budget for a third-place finish each season, and since 2013 this has been achieved in each of the last 10 years, with Ireland also winning four titles (including two Grand Slams), while finishing as runners-up on two occasions.
Winning the championship and completing the Grand Slam would have netted the IRFU about €2 million more than they bargained for, but that doesn’t take into account all the other myriad feelgood factors at play when Ireland were coronated on St Patrick’s Day after completing a first slam in Dublin.
So it is that whereas other squad announcements this week came with talk of new World Cup cycles, with England, France and Wales selecting seven, six and five uncapped players respectively, there were none in the 34-man Irish squad.
Granted, the uncapped trio of Oli Jager, Thomas Ahern and Sam Prendergast were named as additional training panellists, but in all other respects the composition of this squad leaves Ireland looking the most settled.
Of course, the retirement of Johnny Sexton is perhaps enough of a sea change in its own right, given his hugely influential role as captain, outhalf, goalkicker, chief strategist and driving force – indeed all bar driving the bus really.
Farrell has retained all but seven of his 33 men at the 2023 World Cup in France, and the exceptions were all due to retirement (Sexton and Keith Earls) or injury (Rob Herring, Dave Kilcoyne, Ross Byrne, Mack Hansen, Jimmy O’Brien).
In their place come Tom Stewart, Cian Healy, Ciarán Frawley, Harry Byrne, Jordan Larmour, Jacob Stockdale and Calvin Nash, while Nick Timoney has been rewarded for his resurgent form with Ulster of late as an additional backrow ahead of Cian Prendergast.
Healy had been picked for the World Cup before suffering a knee injury in the final warm-up game against Samoa in Bayonne, where Stewart, Frawley and Stockdale (as well as the older Prendergast) were informed by Farrell that they had just missed the cut.
Byrne has been in and out of the squad before, as has Larmour many times (including last year’s Six Nations), while Nash was on the Emerging Ireland tour and part of the wider World Cup training squad. There were no surprises in this squad, no rabbits out of the hat. No Simon Zebo, predictably, despite no obvious cover for Hugo Keenan at fullback, save for Frawley and maybe Crowley. The four locks from the World Cup are the same, so too the five backrows (plus Timoney), the three scrumhalves and the four centres.
Farrell’s choice of the 34-year-old Peter O’Mahony, one of the three remaining centurions in the squad along with Healy and Conor Murray, as captain was also with the here and now very much in mind, whatever about the medium to long-term. As the IRFU are not renewing his central contract and thus far there has been no offer from Munster this, after all, could conceivably even be O’Mahony’s last season of professional rugby.
Having captained Ireland 10 times on separate occasions before, as well as the British and Irish Lions in the first Test in New Zealand in 2017, O’Mahony is the most experienced member of the squad when it comes to captaining at international level.
The next in that list, James Ryan, would have seemed the next captain most likely prior to the World Cup. He would have been considered along with his co-captain at Leinster, Garry Ringrose, while despite their limited experience of the role even with Leinster, most likely Dan Sheehan and Caelan Doris were in the conversation too.
That Ryan has not been conferred as Sexton’s anointed heir as captain perhaps also underlined that secondrow will arguably be Farrell’s most difficult selection choice of all in this Six Nations, beginning with that daunting opening Friday night assignment against France in Marseille’s Stade Velodrome on February 2nd.
The mobile, 6′ 6″, 112kg Joe McCarthy – a rare beast by Irish standards – has blossomed further since the World Cup and is looking more and more of a likely starter, or at any rate in the math-day 23 against France, while Tadhg Beirne and Iain Henderson have their credentials.
In most all other respects, the starting team in Marseille would seem pretty clear-cut – much like this squad – with the exception of right wing in the absence of Hansen and the retired Earls. This would seem to rest between Nash, who is the next in line based on the wider World Cup selection, and Larmour, who has benefited from a run of nine games this season, scoring five tries.
Alternatively, Farrell and co could opt for a more experienced combination by moving Ringrose to the wing, so reuniting Bundee Aki and Robbie Henshaw in midfield. But given how razor sharp Ringrose looked in his natural fit at 13 of late, this seems less likely.
Ireland Six Nations squad
Forwards: Tadhg Furlong, Finlay Bealham, Tom O’Toole, Rónan Kelleher, Dan Sheehan, Tom Stewart, Andrew Porter, Jeremy Loughman, Cian Healy, Iain Henderson, Tadhg Beirne, Joe McCarthy, James Ryan, Peter O’Mahony (captain), Josh van der Flier, Caelan Doris, Jack Conan, Nick Timoney, Ryan Baird.
Backs: Jamison Gibson-Park, Craig Casey, Conor Murray, Jack Crowley, Harry Byrne, Ciarán Frawley, Robbie Henshaw, Bundee Aki, Garry Ringrose, Stuart McCloskey, Hugo Keenan, Jacob Stockdale, James Lowe, Calvin Nash, Jordan Larmour.
Training panellists: Oli Jager, Tom Ahern, Sam Prendergast
