WALES HAVE BEEN consulting with World Rugby referee’s chief Alain Rolland over their scrummaging ahead of a Six Nations trip to Ireland this weekend.
New head coach Wayne Pivac saw his team concede three scrum penalties in a 42-0 hammering of Italy and knows he cannot afford to let the Irish pack get on top in the tight if his side is to notch a Welsh record ninth successive Six Nations win on Saturday.
“We’ve done an extensive review of our performance against Italy and we’ve spoken with the match officials to get their take on the scrummaging and what to expect this weekend, amongst other things,” said Pivac.
“We’ve done as much as we can and we’ll be going out with a very positive mindset in the scrums.
I spoke to Allain earlier on in the week and sent some clips through of some of our scrums just for clarification.
Advertisement
“I’ll be speaking to the referee before the match as well just to make sure we are all on the same page before we instruct the players. It’s really important from any team’s perspective that we understand where the match official is going to come from at the scrum and breakdown.
“We’ve been doing that this week and I think we’ve had a lot of clarity from it. We’ll finish it off with a good meeting on Friday.”
France’s Romain Poite is in charge at the Aviva Stadium for a game that will determine which one of the two teams will progress into round three with a 100 per cent record. Poite was the referee when Wales crucially beat Australia in their World Cup pool match in Japan.
Pivac has made one change from the win over the Italians last weekend, moving George North back to the wing at the expense of Johnny McNicholl and giving new recruit Nick Tompkins a first start at outside centre.
McNicholl drops to the bench, where there are four other newcomers in Rhys Carre, Adam Beard, Gareth Davies and Owen Williams. Tompkins, a World Rugby Junior Championship winner with England in 2014, scored a try on his debut off the bench last weekend and Pivac admitted the Saracen centre’s performance against Italy meant he deserved to start in Dublin.
“We were happy with George in the centre. He got his hands on the ball a lot more, but we just felt we couldn’t leave Nick out based on his performance,” said Pivac.
“I thought he played very, very well against Italy and he deserves a chance – that’s what he’s getting. It shows every player in the squad that if you play well, then you get rewarded.
“For a young man Nick is a seasoned pro who handles himself very well.
“He’s very impressive and I hope he goes as well starting as he did coming off the bench. It was a very good piece of business getting him to commit to Wales.”
Last month Tompkins was merely dreaming about breaking into the Saracens side to face Leinster at the Aviva Stadium in the quarter-finals of the Heineken Champions Cup.
Now the Dublin venue will be the stage for his first international start.
Bernard Jackman joins Murray Kinsella and Gavan Casey to preview Ireland-Wales and England’s trip to Murrayfield
Related Reads
'The Test arena is intense and you need to be emotionally right'
‘I’m not going to try and over-egg it, we got lucky in 2009’ – BOD opens up about Ireland’s grand slam year
'I think if Conor isn't an 8/10 this week, you can't really keep picking him'
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Close
11 Comments
This is YOUR comments community. Stay civil, stay constructive, stay on topic.
Please familiarise yourself with our comments policy
here
before taking part.
Wales 'sent clips' to World Rugby over scrummaging errors ahead of Ireland showdown
WALES HAVE BEEN consulting with World Rugby referee’s chief Alain Rolland over their scrummaging ahead of a Six Nations trip to Ireland this weekend.
New head coach Wayne Pivac saw his team concede three scrum penalties in a 42-0 hammering of Italy and knows he cannot afford to let the Irish pack get on top in the tight if his side is to notch a Welsh record ninth successive Six Nations win on Saturday.
“We’ve done an extensive review of our performance against Italy and we’ve spoken with the match officials to get their take on the scrummaging and what to expect this weekend, amongst other things,” said Pivac.
“We’ve done as much as we can and we’ll be going out with a very positive mindset in the scrums.
“I’ll be speaking to the referee before the match as well just to make sure we are all on the same page before we instruct the players. It’s really important from any team’s perspective that we understand where the match official is going to come from at the scrum and breakdown.
“We’ve been doing that this week and I think we’ve had a lot of clarity from it. We’ll finish it off with a good meeting on Friday.”
France’s Romain Poite is in charge at the Aviva Stadium for a game that will determine which one of the two teams will progress into round three with a 100 per cent record. Poite was the referee when Wales crucially beat Australia in their World Cup pool match in Japan.
Pivac has made one change from the win over the Italians last weekend, moving George North back to the wing at the expense of Johnny McNicholl and giving new recruit Nick Tompkins a first start at outside centre.
McNicholl drops to the bench, where there are four other newcomers in Rhys Carre, Adam Beard, Gareth Davies and Owen Williams. Tompkins, a World Rugby Junior Championship winner with England in 2014, scored a try on his debut off the bench last weekend and Pivac admitted the Saracen centre’s performance against Italy meant he deserved to start in Dublin.
“We were happy with George in the centre. He got his hands on the ball a lot more, but we just felt we couldn’t leave Nick out based on his performance,” said Pivac.
“I thought he played very, very well against Italy and he deserves a chance – that’s what he’s getting. It shows every player in the squad that if you play well, then you get rewarded.
“For a young man Nick is a seasoned pro who handles himself very well.
“He’s very impressive and I hope he goes as well starting as he did coming off the bench. It was a very good piece of business getting him to commit to Wales.”
Last month Tompkins was merely dreaming about breaking into the Saracens side to face Leinster at the Aviva Stadium in the quarter-finals of the Heineken Champions Cup.
Now the Dublin venue will be the stage for his first international start.
Bernard Jackman joins Murray Kinsella and Gavan Casey to preview Ireland-Wales and England’s trip to Murrayfield
The42 Rugby Weekly / SoundCloud
The42 is on Instagram! Tap the button below on your phone to follow us!
To embed this post, copy the code below on your site
Alain Rolland clean up Six Nations Ireland Wales Wayne Pivac world rugby