Ahead of Ireland's first game at the Rugby World Cup, excitement is building across the island.
First up for Andy Farrell's men today is Romania. Ranked at 19th in the world, only Namibia and World Cup debutants Chile come into the tournament at a lower ranking.
Despite this, Farrell has opted for a strong line-up to kick off their campaign. Jonathan Sexton returns after six months out through a combination of injury and suspension.
In the forwards, it's almost a full strength pack for Ireland, with only the likes of regular starters Josh Van Der Flier and Dan Sheehan missing out on a place the starting XV.
On paper, Ireland are expected to blow Romania away, especially with the type of team picked by Andy Farrell.
READ HERE: Ireland v Romania At Rugby World Cup: TV Info, Kickoff Time, Team News
Stephen Ferris agrees with Farrell's approach
Speaking to us in association with Ladbrokes, former Ireland and Ulster back row Stephen Ferris thinks that there's no point waiting to see how other games will play out and that Ireland naming a strong side is certainly what he expected.
It's an extremely strong Irish side and that's what I expected it to be. I think they can mix it up a little when it comes to Tonga, but then you're going to have to go absolutely full bore once again against South Africa. I don't think anybody in the Rugby World Cup is in a position where you can go 'Okay, we'll wait and see what the first game does, the France versus New Zealand game and see how we want to try and play it.' To get probably New Zealand out of it. If you do that, all of a sudden you're putting all your eggs in the one basket against Scotland if you don't really need to beat South Africa to get the draw that you want.
Ferris also think's that this Romanian side will struggle to match Ireland's intensity, and he, like many, is predicting a big win for Ireland.
You know this is going to have to be flat out tomorrow afternoon against Romania, which should be a cricket score. Looking at the handicap on the betting it's 62 points. If Romania were playing in the AIL I think they would struggle. Yes of course their grassroots rugby has come on, they do have a forward game that is more or less based on passion. Their skillset, their coaching quality that they get isn't probably of the same level.
Are they going to spring a surprise ? Absolutely not. You would expect Ireland to put between 60 and could be 90 points on this team. If you think about it, they could easily run in 10 tries, knock over eight of the conversions and before you know it you're up to nearly 70 points. I think it's going to be a handy-ish day for Ireland, but brilliant day for the guys to get game time. Their legs are going to be hot and steamy in Bordeaux. Exactly what you want for what a lot of people would say is probably another warm up game. Hopefully Johnny Sexton can play 50,60 minutes in it, Hugo Keenan, Tadhg Furlong, Andrew Porter, Tadhg Beirne, all the big names that we want to keep fit throughout this tournament can get a good bit of game time in their legs. Then offload the bench whenever needs to be.
Tomorrow's game is likely to be the final bit of preparation for Ireland before what the country hopes will be a long tournament ahead.
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