Ireland U20’s showed little spark in this match against their Welsh counterparts surrendering somewhat meekly 19 – 12 at Parc Eirias, Colwyn Bay, on Friday night.

I’d complained in my previous U20’s write up that there should be more of Ulster’s U20 Inter-provincial winning players in this squad and having watched this game I’ve no reason to change my mind.

In fact, with a back line struggling to make a break the entire match, it is something of a mystery that the exciting young talent, Jacob Stockdale, was the only player not to get a run out!

Having watched the Interpro’s earlier this season I was looking forward to a very competitive outing from Ireland in the Six Nations but this result, combined with the home defeat to England, makes the campaign a bit of a disappointment. Certainly it’s one where Ireland have punched below their weight given the crop of youngsters available.

Both teams had to contend with an overly officious referee who seemed determined to stop a game breaking out. Ireland struggled to come to terms with his interpretations throughout the first half and the damage was done just before the break when the Welsh managed to pull away from the tit for tat penalty awards which saw the game stand at 6 – 6.

Wales inched in front with a 38th minute penalty and just as Ireland pushed to regain parity a turnover saw Wales race clear to open up a 10 point gap with a converted try.

Match Timeline

Wales U20 v Ireland U20 Timeline

04 – PEN	Wales	3 – 0
11 – PEN	Ross Byrne	3 – 3
25 – PEN	Wales	6 – 3
35 – PEN	Ross Byrne	6 – 6
38 – PEN	Wales	9 – 6
40 – TRY	Wales	14 – 6
40 – CON	Wales	16 – 6
40	HALF TIME	16 – 6
52 – PEN	Wales	19 – 6
52 – SUB	O’Connor for Romainne
55 – PEN	Ross Byrne	19 – 9
61 – PEN	Ross Byrne	19 – 12
65 – YC	Jeremy Loughman
67 – SUB	Porter for Oliver (Temp)
73 – SUB	McBurney for McCall
	McVeigh for Oliver
78 – SUB	Young for McCarthy
	Carbery for Byrne
80	FULL TIME	19 – 12

It was too big a lead for Ireland to recoup in the second half and losing prop Jeremy Loughman for 10 minutes in an already under pressure scrum didn’t help their cause.

As it was, an out of sorts Ireland showed little creativity behind the scrum making the lateness of the replacement of Nick McCarthy and Ross Byrne and the non appearance of Stockdale something of a mystery!

Ireland U20’s: Billy Dardis (Leinster), Ciaran Gaffney (Connacht), Garry Ringrose (Leinster), Sam Arnold (Ulster), Stephen Fitzgerald (Munster), Ross Byrne (Leinster), Nick McCarthy (Leinster), Jeremy Loughman (Leinster), Zac McCall (Ulster), Oisin Heffernan (Leinster), Cian Romaine (Connacht), Josh Murphy (Leinster), Nick Timoney (Leinster), Conor Oliver (Leinster), Lorcan Dow (Ulster). Replacements: Adam McBurney (Ulster), Andrew Porter (Leinster), Conan O’Donnell (Connacht), David O’Connor (Leinster), Stephen McVeigh (Connacht), Connor Young (Ulster), Joey Carbery (Leinster), Jacob Stockdale (Ulster)

1. Unfortunately details of Welsh scorers are no longer available. If anyone has a recognised source please feel free to let us know. ↩︎