Ireland Men: Who Did What in the Summer Series

Ireland completed two matches in July as part of their Summer Series sponsored by Vodaphone. Whether the matches were necessary, after a long and difficult 18 months of practically non stop rugby for the International cohort is another matter but I’m sure that all the players that got their first caps won’t be complaining!

Ireland played teams classified as “Tier 2” opposition in Japan and the USA though there was a significant difference between the quality of the two sides, and based on the continuing growth, and style of play, of rugby in Japan it may not be that long before they are routinely beating Tier 1 sides.

The USA, however, have a bit to go, though if they do ever harness their huge player potential they could improve very quickly.

Results

SAT 3 JULIRELAND 3931JAPAN AVIVA STADIUM
SAT 10 JULIRELAND 7110USAAVIVA STADIUM

Players Used

Andy Farrell used 34 players over the two matches with 9 players making their senior debut’s. Munster’s picked up his first cap against Japan and , , , , , , and all debuted against USA.

The 34 players used had the following provincial breakdown.

Connacht 514.8%
Leinster 1029.4%
Munster1029.4%
Ulster 926.4%

Minutes Played

When it comes to minutes on the pitch we see a slightly different picture as Leinster continue to dominate rugby in Ireland, with the D4 based players racking up at least 10% more game time than any of the other provinces.

Ulster’s minutes played percentage is nearly twice as high as the 12.8% minutes played they clocked up during the Six Nations.

Player Statistics

We are presenting the key player statistics in the web story below which you can scroll through and easily share on mobile. If you want the stats in standard format then scroll on down.

Minutes Played

Of the 34 players used, 8 played more than 80 minutes, 16 played between 40 and 80 minutes and 10 played less than 40 minutes. The full minutes played for all players is shown below.

PLAYERPROVINCEMINUTES
Caelan DorisLEI160
Hugo KeenanLEI160
Stuart McCloskeyULS160
James RyanLEI160
Joey CarberyMUN133
Ronan KelleherLEI124
Dave KilcoyneMUN112
Gavin CoombesMUN90
Robert BaloucouneULS80
James HumeULS80
Jacob StockdaleULS80
Josh Van Der FlierLEI80
Ryan BairdLEI78
Jamison Gibson-ParkLEI75
Tom O’TooleULS72
Peter O’MahonyMUN70
Finlay BealhamCON66
Craig CaseyMUN63
Ultan DillaneCON59
Nick TimoneyULS53
Shane DalyMUN50
Ed ByrneLEI48
Chris FarrellMUN42
Andrew ConwayMUN41
Will AddisonULS39
Billy BurnsULS38
Jordan LarmourLEI30
Harry ByrneLEI27
Paul BoyleCON27
Dave HeffernanCON26
Fineen WycherleyMUN23
John RyanMUN22
Caolin BladeCON22
Rob HerringULS10

Scorers

Ireland scored 110 points over the two games from 15 tries, 13 conversions and 3 penalties. All the scorers are shown below.

PLAYERPROVINCEMINTRYCONPENPTS
Joey CarberyMUN1339327
Ronan KelleherLEI124420
Stuart McCloskeyULS160210
Finlay BealhamCON66210
Harry ByrneLEI2736
Hugo KeenanLEI16015
Gavin CoombesMUN9015
Robert BaloucouneULS8015
Jacob StockdaleULS8015
Josh Van Der FlierLEI8015
Nick TimoneyULS5315
Chris FarrellMUN4215
Will AddisonULS3912

Carries

Ireland carried for 1,137 meter. Baloucoune and McCloskey toped the meter making efforts though I’d guess it took considerably more effort for McCloskey, half of Baloucoune’s coming from a single try scoring run. 

Ireland completed 259 carries with an average of 4.4 meters per carry. McCloskey, Doris and Keenan all averaged over 5 meters per carry. In a rather sedate series, by his own standards, clocked in at 15 meters from 13 carries. The top 10 meters carried is shown below.

PLAYERPROMINMETERSCARRIESM/C
Robert BaloucouneULS801591015.9
Stuart McCloskeyULS160127255.1
Caelan DorisLEI160125225.7
Hugo KeenanLEI160110225.0
Andrew ConwayMUN4198714.0
Ronan KelleherLEI12492214.4
Will AddisonULS396187.6
Gavin CoombesMUN9046123.8
James HumeULS8041113.7
Jamison Gibson-ParkLEI753866.3

Tackles

Ireland completed 220 tackles over the two matches. Ryan weighs in with the most tackles, with 21 fairly high considering the nature of the games, and McCloskey had a busy couple of outings adding 19 tackles to his 25 carries. The top 10 tackles, plus their missed tackles and tackle success is shown below.

PLAYERPROMINTACKLE
MADE
TACKLE
MISSED
TACKLE
SUCCESS
James RyanLEI16021195%
Stuart McCloskeyULS16019290%
Caelan DorisLEI16016289%
Josh Van Der FlierLEI8013287%
Joey CarberyMUN13313668%
Gavin CoombesMUN90120100%
Ronan KelleherLEI12411192%
Ultan DillaneCON59100100%
Dave KilcoyneMUN1129190%
Ed ByrneLEI489190%

Ulster Variance

We’ve summated the statistics for Ulster players only and adjusted them for the minutes played to determine if the Ulster players were under or over performing in the key areas.

This is easiest displayed in the graph below.

However if you want to look at the figures in more detail you can have a look at the contributions for each of the Provinces, for some of the stats, below. We haven’t included everything as it gets a bit messy!

PRVPLAYERMIN
PLAYED
TRIESMETERS
CARRIED
TOTAL
CARRIES
METERS
/CARRY
TACKLES
MADE
TACKLES
MISSED
TACKLE
SUCCESS
CON5200225161.5627196.4%
LEI1094264301143.77901684.9%
MUN106462269604.48581184.1%
ULS96125413695.9945786.5%
TOTALS3424001511372594.392203586.3%

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