Ireland’s World Cup squad in numbers

Joe Schmidt finally confirmed his World Cup squad this morning - here's how the squad breaks down...

17 - members of the 31-man squad going to their first World Cup 16 - Leinster players chosen, well ahead of Ulster's seven, Munster's six (we're giving them Paulie) and the two from Connacht 10 - players over the age of 30, led by 35-year-olds Paul O'Connell and Mike Ross 28.8 - average age of the squad, with the forwards coming in at 29.4 and the backs at 27.9   1,043 - total number of caps in the squad, an average of 33 per man 82 - caps for centre Gordon D'Arcy, who we could have seen for the final time on a professional rugby field after he was left out 2 - scrum-halves in the panel, the biggest risk taken by Schmidt 4 - positions being covered in some form by Ian Madigan. The Leinster man goes into the tournament as equal second choice out-half, third choice scrum-half, third choice inside centre and fourth choice full-back 2 - Rob and Dave Kearney are just the second set of brothers to represent Ireland in the same World Cup squad, joining Richard and Paul Wallace in 1995. 0 - minutes played by first choice prop Cian Healy in preseason so far 109 - total number of international minutes played by Nathan White and Tadhg Furlong, the two back-ups to tighthead stalwart Mike Ross 18 - days until our first game against Canada