State of the Nation: Ireland ‘definitely trust again’ in Andy Farrell after damaging start where ‘the knives were out’ for his ‘jumbled-up team’
Ireland's two overnight sensations in the 2026 Six Nations, Stuart McCloskey and, inset, Robert Baloucoune
Following the conclusion of the 2026 Six Nations, we are updating you on the state of the participating nations. First up, it’s Andy Farrell’s Ireland.
The Irish arrived at this year’s tournament under a cloud, as having Farrell back at the helm following his British and Irish Lions sabbatical hadn’t produced the hoped-for Autumn Nations Series lift.
Their losses to New Zealand and South Africa were far too comfortable and lacked the jeopardy of a competitive side, and our November post-mortem on Planet Rugby suggested that a “collective rethink” was needed now that they had clearly fallen behind the world’s top two.
This concern lumbered into February, where the Round One shellacking away to France and then the odd situation that was being behind at the break to Italy in Dublin rankled. Farrell’s bench came to the rescue that Saturday afternoon, and it became sunny from there.
England were demolished by a performance for the ages in London, and while the follow-up home win over Wales wasn’t without anxiety for Ireland, there was a reassuring consistency to their polished play that defeated Scotland for the Triple Crown and left them coming with that last-gasp Thomas Ramos penalty for France against England of winning the Championship title for the third time in four years.
It was a Six Nations rejuvenation that sets Ireland up nicely for their July Nations Championship travels to Australia, Japan and New Zealand. In Faz, the Irish definitely trust again.
Six Nations summary
While Ireland enthusiastically hopped, skipped and jumped into the March afternoon last Saturday, having flashed their Hollywood smiles for the Triple Crown paparazzi and their now adorning-again fans, this buoyant Dublin mood was in stark contrast to the febrile atmosphere that existed at the start of February when the knives were out for Farrell and his jumbled-up team.
If there was a game plan titled ‘Winning in Paris’, it was quickly tossed in the shredder as Ireland sorely went missing in action at the Stade de France. Preparations weren’t helped by injuries to their leading props, Andrew Porter and Tadhg Furlong, full-back Hugo Keenan and some others, and the suspension controversy that sidelined midfielder Bundee Aki was another headache.
However, Farrell compounded this unease by backing Sam Prendergast as his starting out-half, which was the wrong call for a team under the pump. A miserably one-sided first half ended with the Irish trailing 0-22, and the four-try bonus point was then surrendered just seven minutes into the second half.
Eventually beaten 14-36, Farrell reacted by making six changes to his XV, but his decision to keep Prendergast at the wheel was a gamble that backfired. Struggling for go-forward off the No.10 and with their scrum crumpling, the Irish went off trailing 5-10 at the break.
It needed the relief of the scrubbed out Louis Lynagh try for a debatable forward pass for the bench cavalry to arrive and save the day, and the scare of this 20-13 success became the catalyst for the gear shift that followed away to England. The promotion of Jack Crowley to start at out-half was one of five transformational changes and they had the English hung, drawn and quartered by the time of Dan Sheehan’s 42nd minute try.
The Round Four performance at home to Wales was never going to match what they had produced to fillet England 42-21, but the Irish, who again made another five alterations to their selection, saw out the win coming down the finish straight, scoring eight late points to confirm the 27-17 victory.
As ever with the Scots, they were overhyped. There was so much optimistic Scottish chatter about how this was finally their time, but it was just another outpouring of verbal diarrhoea.
Farrell’s Irish side, a selection with four changes on this occasion, raced away with the contest at the start and again at the finish, leading 19-7 at the interval and then cantering to a 43-21 success after the gap had closed to 26-21 with 19 minutes to go.
That was an impressive conclusion to a Six Nations that had grave portents just five weeks earlier.
Ireland: Andy Farrell addresses long-term future after Triple Crown success
Standout players
Thirty-five players were capped by Farrell over the course of Ireland’s five Six Nations matches – 26 as starters. That was two more than the 33 used in the four-game November, and while that Autumn Nations Series didn’t produce out-and-out standouts, there were several impressive spring candidates by the time referee Luke Pearce’s final whistle brought the curtain down last Saturday on the four-match winning run that followed the February 5 drubbing in France.
Before we get on to genuflecting at the altar that was the renewed prowess of skipper Caelan Doris, the tremendous nuisance of Tadhg Beirne and the effervescent energy of Jamison Gibson-Park, we must salute the brilliant impact made by the overnight sensations from Ulster – the 33-year-old Stuart McCloskey and the 28-year-old Robert Baloucoune.
It was 2016 at Twickenham when McCloskey made his Test debut, but his face never fitted under Joe Schmidt – let’s just say, the coach wasn’t a fan of players who like riskily offloading out of the contact. It also took time for Farrell to warm to him, especially as Aki, Robbie Henshaw and Garry Ringrose were already so well established on the roster.
However, Farrell has finally had his thinking swayed, and McCloskey has very much been Ireland’s player of the season, enjoying an even greater consistency in his game than the stupendous Doris, who needed time to rediscover his best following the serious shoulder injury that denied him a Lions tour.
McCloskey’s attacking style – accelerating into the traffic without fear and always looking to keep the ball alive instead of going to ground with it – added an invaluable layer to an Irish approach that had stalled ever since assistant Andrew Goodman took over this brief from Mike Catt after the summer of 2024 in South Africa.
His best front-foot moment was the American football quarterback pass he threw to Baloucoune to get a struggling Ireland into the lead against Italy, and every Irish fan simply loved how he embraced the seemingly lost cause of chasing after Marcus Smith in London, an initially lop-sided race that he recovered to joyously win and rag-doll his bamboozled opponent into touch.
As for Baloucoune, he had been overlooked by Farrell ever since a fourth cap in November 2022. With his form and fitness a repetitive issue at Ulster, an international return was far-fetched, but something happened over his most recent winter in Belfast, and he has now signed off on a Six Nations with three well-taken tries, four impressive starts and the BKT Rising Player award, which recognises the most impactful talent featuring in their first ever Championship.
Of course, his defensive mishap with try-scoring Welsh prop Rhys Carré was a sore point, but he didn’t allow that cruel error to define him, demonstrating that he is now very much a long-term option at Test level. That’s quite a change in the pecking order that existed at the start of November.
Switching to the established brigade, Doris was immense in this year’s run of fixtures, keeping the faith following his team’s bumpy start to February and leading the charge, especially in the most acclaimed wins over England and Scotland. His rapport with the referees also improved, something that was needed following the card farce inflicted on Farrell’s crew in the closing November match with the Springboks.
While Doris was a Lions absentee due to injury, the form of those who toured Australia had attracted much scrutiny over the winter. So many looked out on their feet, but the Six Nations flourish engineered by Beirne and Gibson-Park was the beating heart of this Irish rebound.
Post-France, Beirne repeatedly destroyed opposition breakdowns while getting dropped versus Italy was the kick in the arse that rejuvenated Gibson-Park needed and it left him running amok at Twickenham. So vital was he to the tempo of this Irish operation that shadowman Craig Casey was given just a token two minutes last Saturday against the Scots.
This highlighted how there isn’t a genuine competition for the No.9 shirt, even though it was nice to see Nathan Doak given a debut off the bench versus the Welsh. Doak wasn’t the lone fresh face as there were also a Test debut for lock Edwin Edogbo, as well as Six Nations tournament debuts for the likes of Baloucoune, Tommy O’Brien, Tom Farrell, Cormac Izuchukwu, Darragh Murray, Tom Stewart and Michael Milne.
The final word in this section must go to recalibrated out-half Crowley. When Ireland lifted the 2024 Six Nations title with a win over Scotland, he couldn’t have foreseen the frustrating trajectory his Test career would take from there.
It wasn’t easy losing the shirt to whipper-snapper Sam Prendergast, but he patiently waited out the awkward situation to look the part when Prendergast was eventually axed. His final two fingers to his critics came with his touchline conversion at the death against the Scots. The kick was academic in terms of the scoreboard – the Triple Crown had already been secured – but it proved he can do it with style and to hell with the begrudgery.
Stat leaders
Three Irish names kept cropping up in the individual statistic categories – McCloskey, Doris and Beirne. We’ll start with the motivated midfielder who made a tournament third-best 74 carries, a tournament fifth-best eight offloads, a joint first six try assists along with France’s Matthieu Jalibert, and a second-best 20 defenders beaten.
There was also a joint best 18 dominant contacts with England’s Tommy Freeman, a joint best eight turnover wins with Beirne, and 105 post-contact metres, which was second only to England’s Ben Earl.
Switching to Doris, who returned to his pomp following his injury lay-off, there were 65 carries, a fifth-best tournament tally. He was also sixth in the defenders beaten chart with 18, third with his 81 tackles and sixth with 76 post-contact metres. His wholesome back-row contribution was aided by the impact of lock Beirne, who also had a run at blindside. His 73 tackles were a fifth-best total, but his seven jackals were a chart topper.
Sticking with individual figures, Jamie Osborne’s four tries was fifth-highest on that chart, with Crowley’s 47 points making him the third-highest scorer. With Prendergast also in on the kicking duties, Ireland were only the fifth best off the tee with a 74.1 per cent accuracy, making this an area for them to collectively work on in the summer.
Ireland had lineout issues in November, but Dan Sheehan had a fourth-best 96 per cent success rate across the Championship with Ronan Kelleher in fifth on 93.3 per cent. That was a welcome improvement, and it left this set-piece only marginally behind the No. 1 England.
Improved too was their discipline, where just two cards, the yellow given to Casey for poor tackle technique versus Italy and the one that Osborne took for his team defending its line in England, were the only blemishes in a five-game series where 43 penalties were conceded. That was a success, given the concession of 46 penalties, along with two red and six yellow cards, in their four November games.
Ireland did miss 134 tackles, a second-worst tally behind Italy on 161, and Ringrose was the biggest culprit as his 17 misses left him joint second in the individual chart behind Italy’s Giacomo Nicotera on 19. Counterbalancing the Irish winning a joint chart-topping 42 turnovers, including a tournament best 19 jackals.
Looking at the kicking, Gibson-Park dominated by booting it 58 times in play for 1,418 metres, 52 of them box kicks. There were three attacking catches from O’Brien.
Ireland’s 45 offloads were second only to France’s 77; their half-dozen lineout steals were also a second-best figure. And while their 37 dominant tackle contacts were only fifth best, a country mile behind the chart-topping French on 95, they topped the post-contact metres chart with 713 compared to France’s fourth best 595.
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Success story
Whereas this section was a brief blink-and-you-missed-it analysis in November, such was the stalemate surrounding Farrell and his squad, there was plenty to cheer from the second-half of the Round Two win over Italy all the way through to the post-Round Five game celebrations versus Scotland.
There was a glib attitude 13 months ago when Ireland clinched the 2025 Triple Crown in Wales; there was still a Championship title to play for, and the Irish, at that time, viewed themselves in a different, more uppity light.
The crash that materialised the following month and the morass that was then endured in November restored a better sense of humility in the squad, and it meant that winning the Triple Crown this time around became an achievement that merited a proper celebration.
The 2026 campaign generated new Six Nations heroes in McCloskey and Baloucoune, and a more composed way of playing re-emerged with Crowley restored to the No.10 shirt. Ireland’s lineout also restored its credibility, although their scrum remains a delicate situation, while their attack finally re-adjusted to the tempo lost with Catt’s departure.
How they created against England and Scotland suggested that Goodman might actually be good after taking a long time to leave a fingerprint on proceedings. The Ireland team drifted in 2025, a situation not helped by Farrell being away on his nixer, and it has taken some tough love from the coach for them to get back on track.
Being only that Ramos kick away from winning the title was a terrific success after their Thursday fright night in Paris in Round One.
Main regret
We spoke post-November about the lost development ground that Ireland had suffered because Farrell was away with the Lions, but his frequent changes across the Six Nations – rather than the autumn tactic of keeping faith in off-form players – kept his squad on its toes after the opening night no-show in Paris. That fresh pressure on places eventually paid off with the flourishing team collective that delivered a Triple Crown and a second-place finish.
While this team outcome now augurs well for the journey ahead that will culminate at Australia 2027, there was a major individual casualty. Farrell bet the house in November 2024 by elevating provincial rookie Prendergast into the international fold, but the coach’s absence for last year’s Six Nations was a terrible missed opportunity for the player who didn’t make the Lions squad and then proceeded to play inconsistently in November with Ireland.
Farrell’s persistence with Prendergast for the opening two rounds in February then became a bad judgment call. This mentally draining experience robbed the out-half of whatever confidence he had left, and the extent of this damaging ordeal will only be realised when we see him back at Leinster in the coming weeks.
This positional debate generated a lot of personalised hatred online, but the morons who racially attacked Edogbo after the IRFU socialised a picture of him proudly showing his Test cap post-Italy highlighted how the game in Ireland has an underbelly of nastiness that needs to be nuked.
Far too much attention is given to these online numpties, when the dominant focus should be on the avid paying punters who shell out a tiny fortune every time for an Aviva Stadium ticket. These proper fans generated a lovely atmosphere at last Saturday’s finale, demonstrating that you don’t need gallons of booze to create an ambience that drives Farrell’s team on.
That was a lovely communal finish to a campaign that started with Prendergast and Edogbo enduring regrettably awkward situations.
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Results
Ireland LOST 14-36 v France (Paris)
Ireland WON 20-13 v Italy (Dublin)
Ireland WON 42-21 v England (London)
Ireland WON 27-17 v Wales (Dublin)
Ireland WON 43-21 v Scotland (Dublin)
