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Schalk Brits predicts Ireland will flop at the Rugby World Cup
By Ian Cameron
Former Springboks hooker Schalk Brits has predicted that Ireland will flop at the Rugby World Cup in France in a little over three months time.
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Speaking on the RugbyPass Offload Podcast, Brits predicted a gloomly campaign for Andy Farrell’s world no.1s, despite the world beating Test record over the last two seasons.
“Ireland specifically, it’s a bit weird. They’ve never performed in a World Cup and I hope, from our perspective (Springboks’) they keep it there, until they prove it different. They’ve always been great between World Cups, but when the World Cup comes… have they made a quarterfinal, or past a quarter final?
“Unfortunately, that’s a belief that is hard to change within a group. If we take Saracens, I mean, how many finals did we lose in? Eventually then win one, then the belief grows and even in the tight exchanges, you believe, you can win, and sometime that’s just the difference.”
When asked was he ‘basically writing Ireland off’ for the World Cup, he replied “I did not say that!”
“I hope Ireland and South Africa go through to the semis,” before joking: “They going to be going home quite quickly. They’ll have the bus booked for after the pool stages!
Later in the segment, when asked to give his predictions, Brits said “Ireland will come up short under pressure”, predicting South Africa or France were going to win it.
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When co-anchor Max Lahiff predicted that Ireland would ‘flop’, Brits doubled-down on his dire forecast for the Irish, saying ‘I agree. They’re the No.1 team in the world. They’ve won everything at the Six Nations and that’s the other part that will be hard for them, to manage the pressure of being the favourites going into the World Cup, or number 1 or two.
“That is extremely hard to manage that. That is a different kettle of fish.”
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The weather was dreadful but the playing surface was great so there is no real excuse for such another poor standard of play from both sides. Dragons just the better team. But, what a shocking decision by the TMO not to award the Fifita try. This pretty much sums up Welsh rugby with poor teams and poor officials. The WRU have a lot of work to do and it needs to be done quickly to avoid rugby being lost to our future generations.
Go to commentsNo chance of Borthwick selecting any young talent. He announced his selection policy from the outset with naming a poor OF as Captain, retaining an equally poor Youngs and Vunipola brothers when there were many better EQP in the Premiership. SB revival of Leicester was based on SA muscle and a terrific Welsh flanker he has generally ignored young English talent.
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