While most of the nation are wringing hands over who will get the No.10 jersey against France, Joe Schmidt will be fretting over his back three.
Even before Rob Kearney was injured being cleared out of a ruck by a 19-stone Italian prop, Schmidt would have been mulling a tweak in the Irish backline.
This championship is all about consistency – especially since Scotland tipped the cart – but Schmidt is open to making changes to keep his troops fresh.
Andrew Trimble is in contention to come into the back three but it looks as though Schmidt will stick with the men that started against Scotland and Italy.
During The Hard Yards rugby podcast, I argued that a fit again Trimble would be in my Ireland XV to take on France. To accommodate him on the left wing, Simon Zebo would drop into the 15 jersey and Kearney would miss out.
Former Ireland international Donncha O’Callaghan has nothing but praise for the 31-year-old but he would stick with Kearney, if he comes through Thursday’s final training run. O’Callaghan said:
“He’s got a bit of X-factor in that he is so physical and he absolutely creams fellas, both in attack and defence.
“Trimby for an awful lot of team – like we spoke about with Jamie Heaslip – that is massively respected by the players but who has had a really bumpy ride in his international career.
“Finally, all his hard work, it was recognised [in 2014] when we won the Six Nations championships and he got all the plaudits and appreciation that he deserves.
“You want competition for places but you are asking for an awful lot to put guys who are just coming back from injuries into international Test arenas. You have to earn it in training and you have to be training very well. For the last two weeks in camp, it has been up to guys to put names on shirts.
“The Johnny Sexton and Trimble things will be decided on how well they train.”
In the past six months, and six games, only one Ireland team has been accurately predicted by news outlets in advance of the official announcement.
With Schmidt waiting until Thursday at 1pm to finalise his team [and announce it an hour later] we may be left guessing until the last possible moment.
Check out our Ireland vs. France preview in The Hard Yards rugby podcast:
