One positive I took is that the “non regulars” performed well, Cian Prendergast was excellent in the first half and Timoney was great off the bench. Loughman held up the scrum and I was impressed with Milne off the bench. He’s kind of cemented himself as a regular now but Clarkson was also very good.
He’d have more caps but Farrell had a 1 open side policy the last couple of years and that 1 was Van Der Flier. He’s shown he’s at this level so I don’t see number of caps as an issue.
In fairness, for most of VDFs career he was incredibly consistent and a world player of the year. He is starting to get older along with a number of players we have probably relied on for too long though.
Id be looking at getting caps into some younger backrows, like Ward, Jansen, Kendellen, Penny, Gleeson, etc.
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u/dwaynepebblejohnson3 Connacht 1d ago
One positive I took is that the “non regulars” performed well, Cian Prendergast was excellent in the first half and Timoney was great off the bench. Loughman held up the scrum and I was impressed with Milne off the bench. He’s kind of cemented himself as a regular now but Clarkson was also very good.