While the start of the 2023 Six Nations campaign is only a couple of weeks away, discussion is already starting to turn towards the World Cup later this year.
The tournament in France has the potential to be one of the most exciting in quite some time. There is no clear favourite at the moment, although a number of top quality teams will take part.
Ireland are among that group. They are currently ranked as the number one team in the world and have been massively impressive over the last two years.
However, scars of World Cups past ensure that there will always be doubts about the team's ability to perform on the biggest stage. They have also been handed a rather tough draw, with France or New Zealand set to await them in the quarter-finals if they can overcome South Africa and Scotland in their pool.
Heading into his first World Cup as head coach, it will be interesting to see what approach Andy Farrell takes to preparing his squad in the months ahead.
Rory Best calls on Ireland to replicate England World Cup approach
Considering Ireland's record in recent World Cups, a change in approach to their pre-tournament buildup should certainly be considered.
In the past, Ireland head coaches have given a number of players an opportunity to impress prior to the final squad being named, with warmup game often featuring a mix of first choice and fringe squad members.
Rory Best believes Andy Farrell should consider replicating Eddie Jones' approach to the 2019 World Cup.
On that occasion, the England head coach named his squad for the tournament almost a full month before the deadline for submissions. As a result, he was able to work with a smaller group and fine tune his team ahead of the tournament in Japan. England would go on to reach the final.
Speaking ahead of the start of the Six Nations, Best said such an approach approach could well benefit Ireland in 2023 (h/t Irish Independent):
I would say he probably has a good idea what his 23 is, maybe his first choice 25.
You look ahead to the World Cup, you’re always grabbing hold of what we did not do well enough and I think Ireland have been a little bit unlucky.
In 2011, we probably underestimated and didn’t prepare properly for Wales. In 2015 with the injuries we were just a bit unlucky, and in 2019 we underestimated Japan.
You’re always looking at what could be different and maybe this time around I think we’re maybe a little bit guilty of giving squad numbers, up to 38, 39, 40 game time, just because you feel you have to because they’re involved.
Looking back to England at the last World Cup, Eddie Jones naming his team so early meant he had to play that group of players together.
It’s almost like we use the first summer series game as an ‘ah sure, we’ll give those guys a go anyway even though they’ll never make the plane’.
Can Andy actually go, ‘Well I now actually do know who my 36 players are and unless anyone shows me something markedly different, they’re the ones that are going to play. We will actually have guys going there with three games of varying minutes under their belts and we’re going to be match ready for the World Cup’.
There are a couple of games that they should really win leading into that, so you have to factor that in. But I think he’ll be fairly confident that he knows, injury aside, what the bulk of his squad is going to be.
It will be interesting to see what road Andy Farrell goes down this summer, but for now he will be focusing solely on the upcoming Six Nations campaign.
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