The hesitation Matt Williams has about starting Jack Crowley against England and his ‘suck it up’ message to ’emotional’ Ireland fans
Jack Crowley with Andy Farrell at the Aviva Stadium last Friday and, inset, Sam Prendergast
Outspoken pundit Matt Williams has explained why he wouldn’t potentially start Jack Crowley for Ireland against England on Saturday at Allianz Stadium, even though he was his preferred choice as No.10 coming into the Six Nations.
Crowley was Andy Farrell’s pick at the start of the Autumn Nations Series, getting chosen as the starting fly-half against New Zealand and Japan with Sam Prendergast held in reserve. That selection was then reversed, and Prendergast has started the last four Ireland matches, two in November and two more in the Six Nations.
Prendergast has struggled, though, behind a problematic pack and against Italy last time out last Saturday, Ireland were left relying on impetus from a bench that included Crowley to secure their 20-13 comeback win over Italy.
The fallout from the Round Two match has led to speculation that Crowley will now start versus England in London, but Williams is not so sure, suggesting that it might not be fair to promote the fly-half into a difficult assignment while also citing head coach Farrell’s habit of backing under-fire players such as Prendergast when calls for their omission are at their loudest.
“Sam’s a 10, full stop.”
Appearing on Off The Ball Breakfast, Williams was asked what he would do with Prendergast this week, with Ireland fifth on the Six Nations table and heading to Twickenham to face an England side hellbent on making amends for last Saturday’s latest spectacular Calcutta Cup loss to Scotland.
“Very interesting question, isn’t it? Let’s say the Irish bench was highly effective when they came on (against Italy), they did a very good job when they came on there,” he began.
“Chopping and changing, make no bones, I would have picked Jack right through. I felt it should have been the other way around, that Jack Crowley should have been starting, and Sam should have been on the bench. But Jack did a really great job coming on when he did.
“Now you go with a six/two bench, let’s start with that. What do you do if you don’t have Crowley on a six/two bench versus England? Jack can play 10, 12, 15. If you go with a six/two against England and swap them, you put Sam back there; Sam’s a 10, full stop.
“You could see up with England at Murrayfield, with the six/two bench, and when (Henry) Arundell got the red card, he was caught because on his bench he had a specialist nine and a specialist 10. There’s your first issue, so do you go with a five/three? Farrell has gone six/two in recent times against the big nations, so there’s your first one…”
Williams added: “You have got to decide, okay, we are going to Twickenham, these guys are going to be so infuriated with what happened to them at Murrayfield that again Scotland got under their skin.
“What a tough joint it [Twickenham] is mentally, and you are going to face an England side that is going to be ridden all week by their press and their coaches and by themselves that they were second-rate at Murrayfield – and they were compared to what they had done, a 12-game winning streak…
“So here’s the next point: if you take Sam out, what have we seen so far in this Six Nations? France killed Ireland in the first 25 minutes, Scotland killed England in the first 25 minutes, England killed Wales in the first 25 minutes.
“If you go to Twickenham and you’re behind, good night, Irene, it’s over. Your bench isn’t going to come and score 20 points at the end of the game. So you have got to go in there with your best team, and that’s why I would have James Ryan starting and I’d have Tadhg Beirne at six and I would go in with my best, biggest pack I can, get them out there and fire them as long as I can.
“Hopefully you’ll have Tadhg Furlong back, and it’s a pretty good pack then. You can work on your bench, who do you put as your second rows and so on; that’s a discussion. But if you go 20 points behind at Twickenham, you’re finished, it’s over. So, the question is, what would I do?
“Initially, I would have started Jack for all these games so he would have a lot more under his belt. I don’t know if it is fair to Jack to throw him out there right now. I know he’d love it, I know he wouldn’t let us down, but I am just not sure that is the right thing for Ireland or for him. Or are you better off leaving him on the bench but bringing him on a bit earlier?
“I didn’t think Prendergast was disgraceful or really poor in that game. He didn’t have his best game, but you can put that down for a lot of reasons, and you can also hang that around a lot of guys’ necks as well.”
With Williams continuing that it would be a tough call for Harry Byrne to come into the fly-half selection mix in Round Three, as he should have been picked earlier in the Six Nations, he suggested that Farrell was likely to back what he has.
“That’s a separate issue. Right now, I wouldn’t. I would have picked Harry earlier in the Six Nations. To bring him in now, that’s a tough call… Andy is with these guys six days, seven days a week, he will know what’s best, where they are mentally, where they are emotionally.
“Also, he has been at Twickenham, has played there, is an Englishman, he knows what you have got to have is a mental and physical pre-requisite to be successful there, and one of the things Andy is most improved at is his selections, be it as a Lions coach or an Irish coach.
“He gets his selections pretty right a high percentage of the time. Leo Cullen is the other one who does it really well. They get their selections right and that is the biggest influence you can have as a coach.
“I’m sitting on the fence if you really want to get down to it because I don’t know where they have been at training, but Andy, what he has done in the past, he has stuck with his players. He has been pretty strong with that.”
Ireland’s underwhelming campaign so far has ignited claims that they are in decline and won’t be a force again for some time to come, but Williams was adamant that the current pain will be of benefit in the long run. “The Six Nations is super important, and I never want to say forget the Six Nations. I had zero expectations of Ireland in this Six Nations because of the Lions tour and because of the injury profile.
“What this is good for is giving these young guys opportunity. (Jeremy) Loughman, (Thomas) Clarkson, (Cormac) Izuchukwu, (Edwin) Edogbo. Nick Timoney has been playing fantastic, and Stuart McCloskey never let us down, but he has been a great find. All these things going through, that’s going to be great in Australia at the next World Cup and you have to take that opportunity.
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“You can’t stay at the peak for your years. Olympians know how to peak every four years… you can’t be at your best every year and expect to then peak, especially for a small country like Ireland. It’s different for South Africa, New Zealand, England; they have got more resources, but this will be a positive in years to come.
“So yes, suck it up, it’s just the way it is, you can’t do anything about it. That’s what I am saying about the lag; instead of dealing with the reality, we’re dealing with what was (when Ireland were Six Nations champions) and that’s no way to look at our sport. I know it’s difficult, I know it’s emotional, everyone wants to win all the time, but that’s not reality.”
