For the first time ever, the names of the Irish players will appear on the back of the match jerseys when Andy Farrell’s side face Italy at the Aviva Stadium this Saturday (kick-off 8pm) but guessing the identity of them in advance of the customary Thursday afternoon team announcement has rarely been trickier.
The word from the Irish camp is that they are keen to maintain the momentum generated by a ten-game winning run which featured a series win away in New Zealand and a Grand Slam and there is no better way of doing that than by extending that sequence to 13 before the World Cup kicks off.
While the forthcoming warm-up games against Italy, England and Samoa over the next four weeks are an opportunity to maintain momentum and fine tune cohesion without unveiling too much, they are not competitive games and they will also serve to whittle down the current training squad of 42 to 33 names for the World Cup.
As well as competition for places within the World Cup squad, they will serve to shape some of the pecking order for the bigger games in France and players with less certainty than others will be itching for any game time they are offered over this month.
Viewed in that light, the opening Nations Series game against Italy looks a gilt-edged opportunity for Andy Farrell and co to delve a little deeper into the current 42-man squad, while perhaps keeping some of the more established names back for their England game a fortnight later, after next week’s training camp in Portugal.
Ross Byrne is one of those who falls into the latter category and with Johnny Sexton’s suspension representing a silver lining, according to Paul O’Connell, the chances are that Jack Crowley’s end-of-season form when helping Munster end an 11-year trophy drought by winning the URC will see him line-up at “10″ this Saturday.
Although the talented and composed Corkman was a star turn for the Irish Under-20s when they won three from three in the Covid-interrupted 2020 Six Nations campaign, his generation’s senior development suffered from the ensuing hiatus as much as anyone.
Indeed, despite last season’s welcome end-of-season run of games, the versatile Crowley has been restricted to just a dozen competitive starts for Munster at outhalf. Although he impressed when called up as a late starter for Sexton last November against Australia, his only other two caps for Ireland have been off the bench.
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Hence, all game time for the 22-year-old is welcome and all the indications are that Crowley will start alongside his young provincial half-back partner, Craig Casey.
The 23-year-old has ten caps to his name but only two of them have been with the number 9 jersey on his back so this also looks like an ideal opportunity to increase his experience.
As the team display Ireland’s new Canterbury home match kit, others who will be equally keen for an opportunity to state their claims included Jacob Stockdale and Stuart McCloskey. It also seems likely there will be a smattering of experience up front in the likes Rob Herring, Tadgh Furlong, Tadgh Beirne and Jack Conan, in part given they were put up in front of the media this week.
