Ireland have cut their World Cup training squad down from 45 to 43 ahead of their first warm-up match for the tournament.
Joe Schmidt’s Ireland are back in action for the first time since the Six Nations concluded, five months ago. Conor O’Shea’s Italy are paying a visit and will take on Ireland at the Aviva Stadium from 2pm on Saturday.
Ahead of that match, the IRFU has released a brief squad update that looks to have settled the faith of two players – Rory Scannell and Ultan Dillane. In part, the statement reads:
‘The Ireland squad enter their first match week and have returned to their usual Maynooth training base after completing five tough weeks of pre-season training. The squad started with two training weeks at Carton House followed by a week at Connacht Rugby’s base in Galway and a week in UL at Munster’s training base…
‘There have been two regeneration weeks included in the schedule while last week was spent at the IRFU’s new High Performance Centre in west Dublin.
‘Ultan Dillane and Rory Scannell have returned to their provincial bases.’
Scannell is heading back to Munster to filter back into their pre-season plans while Dillane returns to Connacht. While Scannell was an outside bet for a place in the Irish midfield [he has not added to his three caps since 2017], Dillane being cut loose is more of a surprise. The Connacht lock has 14 Test appearances to his name and featured three times in the Six Nations.
(Photo by Brendan Moran/Sportsfile)As well as that update, the IRFU confirmed their now 43-man squad, which includes Ulster’s Will Addison.
Forwards (23)
Finlay Bealham (Buccaneers/Connacht) 9 caps
Rory Best (Banbridge/Ulster) 117 caps
Tadhg Beirne (Lansdowne/Munster) 5 caps
Jack Conan (Old Belvedere/Leinster) 14 caps
Sean Cronin (St Mary’s College/Leinster) 68 caps
Tadhg Furlong (Clontarf/Leinster) 33 caps
Cian Healy (Clontarf/Leinster) 88 caps
Iain Henderson (Queens University/Ulster) 44 caps
Rob Herring (Ballynahinch/Ulster) 7 caps
Dave Kilcoyne (UL Bohemians/Munster) 29 caps
Jean Kleyn (Munster) 0 caps
Jack McGrath (St Marys College/Leinster) 54 caps
Jordi Murphy (Lansdowne/Ulster) 27 caps
Tommy O’Donnell (UL Bohemians/Munster) 12 caps
Peter O’Mahony (Cork Constitution/Munster) 57 caps
Andrew Porter (UCD/Leinster) 14 caps
Rhys Ruddock (Lansdowne/Leinster) 21 caps
James Ryan (UCD/Leinster) 17 caps
John Ryan (Cork Constitution/Munster) 18 caps
Niall Scannell (Dolphin/Munster) 14 caps
CJ Stander (Shannon/Munster) 31 caps
Devin Toner (Lansdowne/Leinster) 64 caps
Josh van der Flier (UCD/Leinster) 17 caps
Backs (20)
Will Addison (Enniskillen/Ulster) 3 caps
Bundee Aki (Galwegians/Connacht) 17 caps
Ross Byrne (UCD/Leinster) 2 caps
Joey Carbery (Clontarf/Munster) 18 caps
Jack Carty (Buccaneers/Connacht) 3 caps
Andrew Conway (Garryowen/Munster) 12 caps
John Cooney (Terenure College/Ulster) 8 caps
Keith Earls (Young Munster/Munster) 77 caps
Chris Farrell (Young Munster/Munster) 5 caps
Mike Haley (Munster) 0 caps
Robbie Henshaw (Buccaneers/Leinster) 37 caps
Dave Kearney (Lansdowne/Leinster) 17 caps
Rob Kearney (UCD/Leinster) 90 caps
Jordan Larmour (St Mary’s College/Leinster) 13 caps
Kieran Marmion (Galwegians/Connacht) 25 caps
Luke McGrath (UCD/Leinster) 10 caps
Conor Murray (Garryowen/Munster) 72 caps
Garry Ringrose (UCD/Leinster) 20 caps
Jonathan Sexton (St Marys College/Leinster) 83 caps
Jacob Stockdale (Lurgan/Ulster) 19 caps
The FootballJOE quiz: Were you paying attention? – episode 10
