The squad for the november nation’s championship northern series will be announced in 1 week from now.

It’s now squad prediction season and it’s a pretty early autumn squad announcement date just like last year

What is everybody’s hot takes for the upcoming season?

My one is I think Matthew Devine will be in the Ireland wider training squad for the six nations, the stats of points scored when he’s on vs off are staggering.

What’s everyone else’s?

Bold indicates injured

Italics indicates academy

I think Munster have the makings of a good squad here. 2 good players in each position. Backs are obviously a problem with all the injuries. The drop off can be quite steep after the first 2 players

Edit: Added some more academy players

I can go through all my caps and pick out plays and moments in games where a team-mate missed a horrendous tackle, one-on-one, and just dived at the floor to pretend he had made an attempt, to make it look like an ankle tap or whatever. But really, he was just diving on the floor. However, if I stayed on my feet and tried to make a tackle, which I have done to every player in my career, and I lost to better offence, I would invariably be singled out in front of the squad at a review. But if it was anyone else? Rob or Felix or Earlsy or whoever, in the review Joe would say: “Oh mate, I know you can do better than that.” And then he’d quickly move on, almost as if it did not happen. That double standard drove me mental, and drove me to dislike Irish camp.

What a sad indictment of a moaner. Zeno saw the writing on the wall and went to France. Once in France all he did was moan about Sexton being picked from France while he wasn’t. If you read the above you won’t have to read his badly written book.

Accusing his team mates of not tackling is something g I’ve not heard of since playing under 8’s. You were an average player Zebo which is why you got dropped now take your few pieces of silver a FO!

I may be wrong but there doesn’t seem to be a URC round up/analysis show which I think would be good. A URC match of the day.

Premier sport has the highlights on the Monday but no talking heads doing analysis.

Against the head is only doing the six nations after RTE dropped the URC.

Is there a YouTube channel doing it?

We've had a few in the 30 years ive been watching the game. The obvious ones for me were Michael Bent and Matt Mostyn.

Who else springs to mind when you think of Irish internationals with a Southern Hemisphere accent?

Players primary positions in brackets

Would any of these players be worth a punt for any of the provinces or has time passes them by?

Please let me know if I’ve missed anyone or if someone isn’t actually IQ

English Championship

Cornish Pirates:

Alessandro Heaney (LH)
James French (TH)

Bedford Blues:

Oisín Heffernan (TH
Joey Conway (LH)
James Lennon (SH)

Ealing Trailfinders:

Rory Scannell (CTR)
Fionn Gibbons (CTR/ W)
Conor Oliver (BR)
Jack Kelleher (BR)
Patrick Campbell (FB)
Hayden Hyde (CTR/W)
Scott Buckley (HK)
Micheal Stronge (SH)
Angus Kernohan (W)
Kyle Hatherell (BR)
James Humphreys (FH)

Coventry:

Peter Sullivan (W)
Tom Bacon (W)
Bruce Houston (FH) [ex Ulster, now representing Zimbabwe on the International stage]

Richmond:

Alex O’Meara (W)
Callum Torpey (HK)
Sam Dardis (CTR)
Sam Pim* (BR)
JJ O’Dea (SR/BR)

Chinnor:

Luke Thompson (HK)
Chris Moore (HK)

Caldy:

Adam McNamee (SR)

Rotherham Titans

Corrie Barrett (TH)

Doncaster Knights:

Zach Kerr

National 1

Plymouth Albion:

Sam Daly (BR)
Cameron Doak (Prop)
Liam Bishop (LH)

London Scottish:

Stephen Kerins (SH
Ntinga Mpiko (TH)
Jack Ingall (BR)

Rosslyn Park:

Donnacha Byrne (BR)

Rams RFC:

Mike Cooke (FH)

Catching a bit of Will Slattery on the indo listing out some of the players not allowed to play for their clubs after less than a full half of test rugby it seems the IRFU are taking the piss with some of the player restrictions.

For example Joe Heyes the starting English tighthead played against Munster in our pre season friendly yet Sam Illo isn’t allowed to play for Connacht after only 30 odd minutes for Ireland during the summer.

It seems damaging to the credibility of club rugby and the supporters who pay good money to see their teams play.

I feel he deserves it, but part of me feels Sam and Jack have this WC sown up, and with the sudden burst of talent we have coming through (2 Munster boys and the Austrian) will it be too late? Sam and Jack will be 25/26 and 28 respectively for the following 6 nations, whereas Frawley will be the wrong side of 30.

I hope the lad gets a shot. But I wouldn't be shocked if he gets a sub-in at the AIs, or more likely, kept in the utility role.