Ireland rings starting XV changes

Robbie Henshaw is not in the Ireland squad for Sundays meeting with Romania in Wembley.

Ian Madigan starts at fly-half, leaving Ulster’s Paddy Jackson primed for action from the bench.

One Romania player who will be praying the Irish defence loses its focus will be Catalin Fercu, who requires just one try to become his country’s record try-scorer.

They defended stoutly but on this evidence but will need to show more attacking threat if they are to finish this World Cup with a victory against either Canada or Italy in Pool D.

“Cian is always an asset whether he’s in the starting team or off the bench”.

Ursache was cited by independent citing commissioner James Absaloms of Kenya after the 38-11 loss to France on Wednesday at the Olympic Stadium. Tongan centre Paula Kinikilau also starts.

One final example of Romania’s loose kicking game comes once again from the hapless Danut Dumbrava.

“They have got a back row…it was interesting the back row that they have used”.

Romania are no pushovers, but Ireland were ruthless throughout at Wembley, sticking to the Schmidt game-plan to the letter.

“If you get a re-injury, then you are really in a situation where his World Cup is in doubt”. The 30-year-old has plied his trade in Romanian club rugby for the last four years, and only now has the chance to step up through the levels. However, he has been stuck on 28 tries for 17 Tests stretching back more than two years.

Jennings said: “We don’t just have a good XV these days”.

“I had a bit of chat with Joe – there wasn’t too much to talk about”. They can put a lot of pressure in that area.

Team manager, Mick Kearney, confirming some players had sat out training earlier in the week but had trained yesterday, said: “The good news to report is that every player is fit and available for the match on Sunday”.

“The whole World Cup is hinged around that, and if we win it the whole World Cup is all hinging around the next game”.

“I remember some of the hopeful emotion that I had going into it – and I remember how hard it is”.

“And I guess the other part is the breakdown”.

Madigan’s conversion made it 25-3 but the target was clearly a fourth try, Romania doing extremely well to hold out past the hour mark.

“Rob was involved in high-speed play immediately after coming on to the pitch”, Schmidt said in the post-match press conference. We didn’t function at the lineout. “This way we feel that we have taken no risk”.

“The ultimate goal would be two wins (at this World Cup)”. We’ve looked at Romania pretty deeply, we’ve been able to look at their games, the video guys have done great work getting a lot of footage of them.