Ireland set for total testing

Over the coming weeks we should be able to judge just how good the current Ireland team is. Following the wins last season over Italy in Rome and France in Dublin, the team was then described by one cross-Channel critic as being promising, but a long way from being "the finished article or in the same league as the England side."

Perhaps it was an accurate assessment based on an objective judgement, perhaps not, but statistics, results, achievements and performances were on his side. England had beaten Wales 44-15, Italy 80-23, Scotland 43-3 and France 48-19.

England had, too, seen off some other challengers of consequence, Australia 22-19, Argentina 19-0 and South Africa 25-17. Their strength was subsequently reflected in the selection of the Lions squad. On that tour a few of their members were as glib of tongue as they are fleet of foot - thus the unedifying controversy we have had.

But right now Irish minds will not be focused on England, but on an appointment in Murrayfield tomorrow. The foot-and-mouth outbreak meant that Ireland would not be tested in the spring by the England team nor the Welsh or Scots for that matter.

So it is that tomorrow we resume against Scotland where we were summarily cut off last season and long before winter wraps its mantle around us, we are back in the Six Nations series.

We have the unique situation of Ireland playing three championship matches in the autumn. We also have a season unlike any other in the history of the game in relation to representative rugby. Not even a World Cup year can compare with Ireland's itinerary. There will be 11 internationals between tomorrow and April 4th.

We have the three outstanding Six Nations matches from last season. Following tomorrow's game in Murrayfield, we are away to Wales on October 13th and at home to England on October 22nd.Then there will be three internationals in the space of a fortnight against Western Samoa on November 10th, New Zealand on November 17th and Canada on November 24th. Then between February 3rd and April 4th come the five matches in the Six Nations Championship.

Ireland will also undertake a tour to New Zealand at the end of the season and that will include two Tests, so it all adds up to 13 internationals in the space of just over nine months.

The upside is that seven of the matches will be at home and that at least will help the Irish supporters. And despite the great interest in, and support for, Irish rugby at present, I wonder what the attendances will be at the three matches in November.

Come to that, I wonder if Ireland's travelling support in Edinburgh and Cardiff will be as big as it invariably is for away matches in the championship. Those matches come very shortly after the annual holidays.

The first test of the revised Ireland team in that long and arduous sequence will come tomorrow. It is a huge match for Ireland and, bear in mind, all honours are still at stake in the Six Nations series - championship, Triple Crown, Grand Slam for Ireland and England. The incentive could not be greater.

"Easterby probably edged Stringer out on the belief that there is greater variety to his game. Yet bearing in mind Stringer's record, it must have been very hard to leave him out. "

When we left Lansdowne Road last February in the afterglow of Ireland's win over France, no one would believe then that the next time Ireland played in the championship we would see a team that embraces six changes in personnel. Let us hope it reflects strength in depth.

The Munster influence, so crucial in lifting Ireland's fortunes after the debacle of Twickenham 2000, has been well diluted. Perhaps it is an indication of the strength of the squad that players of the calibre of Peter Stringer and David Wallace can be left out of the side, and that there is not even room on the bench for the uplifting presence of Mick Galwey.

Out, too, have gone Alan Quinlan and Tyrone Howe, like Wallace a Lion in the summer. Only one of those six alterations has been enforced, the absence through injury of Rob Henderson.

I saw both Stringer and Wallace play extremely well for Munster last Saturday when Wallace was the man of the match. I do not doubt the quality of their replacements, Guy Easterby and Kieron Dawson, but both Stringer and Wallace have every reason to feel disappointed.

Easterby probably edged Stringer out on the belief that there is greater variety to his game. Yet bearing in mind Stringer's record, it must have been very hard to leave him out. Dawson was unfortunate with injury last season, but it must have been a very close call with him and Wallace.

Then bear in mind that the four Irish provinces have qualified for the quarter-finals of the Celtic League with Leinster and Munster topping their groups and Ulster and Connacht finishing second.

The team that beat France included only two players not playing their rugby here - and one of that duo, Henederson, is now going to play his rugby for Munster. The team to play Scotland includes five.

Time was when Murrayfeld was a very fertile venue for Ireland teams. But tomorrow Ireland must break a losing sequence there that goes back to 1987. But then in 2000 Ireland ended a sequence against the Scots without a win since 1988 at Lansdowne Road, beat the French the same year in Paris after almost 30 years and last season won again against France in Dublin for the first time since 1983.

The talent is embraced in this Ireland team to win and keep championship ambitions alive. But what Ireland must not do is allow the Scots to build a lead of any consequence early in the match. We have, in the past, seen the end product of that.