Ireland’s World Cup Woes

Despite beating France for the first time ever in Rugby World Cup history, Ireland suffered a blow to their world cup hopes. With key senior players Paul O’Connell and Peter O’Mahony ruled out with injuries, Ireland’s hopes are hanging in the balance.

Irish Rugby confirmed that O’Mahony has been withdrawn from the squad with knee ligament damage, whilst scans have revealed that O’Connell has suffered significant hamstring damage.

In a further blow to Irish hopes, flanker Sean O’Brien faces a hearing this week. In a seemingly unprovoked violent outburst, O’Brien threw a punch to the body of Pascal Pape during the Group D match against France. Until the replay was shown, I had him down as my man-of-the-match with morst of the inspired rugby coming from O’Brien over the course of the match. Even as an Ireland fan, I would happily give him a ban for the rest of the world cup and even beyond, there’s no place for such behaviour in rugby. However, at the end of the day it’s not for me to say if and how long he should be banned for.

If you haven’t seen it yet, here’s a link so you can decide for yourself.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ffU-ANaVads

It’s not all doom and gloom for the boys in green though as it has been confirmed that Sexton’s injury is not as bad as initially feared. Early reports are stating that the prolific number 10 is on track to be included in the line-up against Argentina at the weekend.

Some good news at last!

With the news of Sexton’s return, our hopes for the world cup may be lifted, however we now have Argentina, who have played well so far even giving the all blacks a good game.

I was confident that we could reach the semi-finals, maybe even the final before the competition began. However, the injury crisis casts a bleak shadow over Irish Rugby and may spell an early end to our tournament in 2015, but that’s just my ignorant opinion.

Could this be the end for Irelands WRC 2015 hopes?

Let us know your opinion!