The teams are up for the World Rugby U20 Championship 9th Place Semi Final between Ireland U20 and Scotland U20 which takes place in Perpignan on Tuesday afternoon. Kick off 4:00 pm local, 3:00 pm UK/IRE.
As expected, it’s been a difficult tournament for the Irish team who were drawn in a tough group. However they will be disappointed that they failed to pick up a win in the pool stages and they will be keen to make a statement, and secure qualification for next season’s tournament, over the next two games.
They face familiar foes in Scotland U20 and the nature of their win against the Scots in the Six Nations fourth round match shows that they can’t take a win for granted. They have continued to show defensive lapses in this tournament and they still need to produce a full 80 minute performance. My own general feeling is that there is a good team in there waiting to burst out but they just seem unable to find the way.
The coaching ticket has looked to the backs to ring the changes with James Hume and Tommy O’Brien moving from the centre to the wings as Sean O’Brien and Peter Sylvester move from the wings to the centre. Harry Byrne comes in at out half and Michael Silvester returns to full back after missing the last game with a knock.
Up front, Joe Byrne comes in for Aungier and Joe Dunleavy and Matthew Agnew return to the starting line up giving Ulster four players in the starting XV with Matthew Dalton retaining his starting spot in second row.
Jonny Stewart takes the squad total to five but the management team have perhaps missed a trick by leaving the recently arrived Michael Lowry out of the selection, the highly rated Ulster out half perhaps being just the man to break down defences late in the game.
The FRU Predicts: Ireland have plenty in attack and it should be enough to bag a high scoring win against a rebuilding Scotland.
| Ireland U20 | Scotland U20 | |
| Michael Silvester | 15 | Paddy Dewhirst |
| James Hume | 14 | Logan Trotter |
| Sean O’Brien | 13 | Cameron Hutchison |
| Peter Sylvester | 12 | Stafford McDowall |
| Tommy O’Brien | 11 | Kyle Rowe |
| Harry Byrne | 10 | Callum McLelland |
| Hugh O’Sullivan | 9 | Charlie Chapman |
| Jordan Duggan | 1 | Sam Grahamslaw |
| Diarmuid Barron | 2 | Robbie Smith |
| Joe Byrne | 3 | Finlay Richardson |
| Matthew Dalton | 4 | Jamie Hodgson |
| Jack Dunne | 5 | Marshall Sykes |
| Joe Dunleavy | 6 | Martin Hughes |
| Matthew Agnew | 7 | Rory Darge |
| Caelan Doris | 8 | Devante Onojaife |
| Dan Sheehan | 16 | Finlay Scott |
| Bryan O’Connor | 17 | Ross Dunbar |
| Jakub Wojtkowicz | 18 | Murphy Walker |
| Charlie Ryan | 19 | Charlie Jupp |
| Jack Daly | 20 | Guy Graham |
| Jonny Stewart | 21 | Charlie Gowling |
| Conor Dean | 22 | Ross Thompson |
| Tom Roche | 23 | Fraser Strachan |