IN THE wake of the runaway defeat of Scotland – in which Limerick’s Conor Murray of Garryowen and UL Bohemian’s Dave Kilcoyne played significant roles – at Rugby World Cup 2023, Head Coach Andy Farrell believes there is a lot more in the Ireland tank.
“I don’t think, and neither do the team think, that we’ve played our best rugby yet. We know where we want to go and want we’re trying to achieve,” he said after the 36-14 win in Paris.
“Will we ever get there? I don’t know. It’s days like next week that’s coming where we need to find out a little bit more about ourselves. These lads are certainly willing to do that.”
Ireland trio James Lowe (replaced at half time by Murray), Mack Hansen, and James Ryan all suffered knocks at the weekend, and are all a cause of selection concern ahead of Saturday’s quarter-final against New Zealand at the same venue (8pm).
Keith Earls of Young Munster skipped the pre-match warm up on Saturday, but this is understood to have been a precautionary measure.
Ireland are slight favourites to beat the All-Blacks in the upcoming quarter final.
