Haven't seen a lot of Scarlets this year but Davies at 7 has been key to most of what they do so he will be a big loss. Might have the name wrong but I feel like Shingler came in for them last year and destroyed us at the breakdown. We have serious problems playing against two sevens (most teams would I suppose) so hopefully their backrow is a bit lopsided.

connachta wrote:

15 Michael Collins

Really? A hundred years later, and now playing for the British? :lol:

Especially with King in the side.
I was hoping we'd start James Connolly, to remind him who he should be serving.

15 Michael Collins

Really? A hundred years later, and now playing for the British? :lol:

Dillane is a beast, Browne a lineout catcher, Muldowney a perfect impact player Shingler/Barclay Vs Masterson/Heenan/Muldoon, will be a hard-fought battle at the breakdown.

Good strong starting team, very strong bench! Hopefully we will get a badly needed win, I'm optimistic

I like the look of this squad, 1 to 8 look good with options from the bench. I was looking forward to seeing danie poolman back but no mention? Is He Fully Fit yet? We need points, cmon lads.

Connacht team to face Scarlets
08th January 2016

Head Coach Pat Lam has named his side to face league leaders Scarlets in Wales on Sunday. There is just one change to the Connacht side that travelled to play Leinster on New Year’s Day. Second row Ultan Dillane, fresh from his first inclusion with the Ireland training squad on Sunday, rotates with Aly Muldowney.

Sunday’s clash will make it eight appearances and six starts this season for 22-year-old Dillane, having made his senior debut while still in the Academy last term.

Jack Carty and Kieran Marmon are retained at half back while Niyi Adeolokun, try scorer for Connacht at Parc y Scarlets last season, starts on the right wing with Matt Healy on the left.

Up front, John Muldoon, who this week signed up for his fourteenth season at the province, will captain the side. Jake Heenan, who made his season debut last week after nearly 10 months on the sidelines, will start again at openside flanker.

The bench remains unchanged with the inclusion of Muldowney.

Commenting on the team selection and the upcoming game, Pat Lam said:

“While we were disappointed with the outcome last week against Leinster, there were a lot of positives we could take from the performance. We travel with the same squad to take on a strong Scarlets side on their home pitch this weekend. There are certain aspects of our game that we are looking to improve from last week. With a solid week’s training under our belt, we go with confidence knowing that if we add clinical execution to the work ethic already shown, we’ll have every chance of getting the points on offer.”

Connacht team to face Scarlets, Sunday, January 10th, 17:00

15 Tiernan O’Halloran

14 Niyi Adeolokun

13 Bundee Aki

12 Craig Ronaldson

11 Matt Healy

10 Jack Carty

9 Kieran Marmion



1 Finlay Bealham

2 Tom McCartney

3 Nathan White

4 Ultan Dillane

5 Andrew Browne

6 John Muldoon (captain)

7 Jake Heenan

8 Eoghan Masterson



Replacements:

16 Dave Heffernan

17 Ronan Loughney

18 Rodney Ah You

19 Aly Muldowney

20 Sean O’Brien

21 Ian Porter

22 AJ MacGinty

23 Rory Parata



Unavailable / Injured: Denis Buckley, JP Cooney, Ben Marshall, Quinn Roux, Nepia Fox-Matamua, Eoin McKeon, John Cooney, Dave McSharry, Robbie Henshaw, Conor Finn, Darragh Leader.

Scarlet's team is out. Barclay returns at 7 to aleviate their back row problems somewhat:

15 Michael Collins, 14 Steff Evans, 13 Regan King, 12 Hadleigh Parkes, 11 DTH van der Merwe, 10 Aled Thomas, 9 Aled Davies, 1 Rob Evans, 2 Ken Owens ©, 3 Samson Lee, 4 Tom Price, 5 Lewis Rawlins, 6 Aaron Shingler, 7 John Barclay, 8 Morgan Allen

Replacements: Ryan Elias, Phil John, Rhodri Jones, Maselino Paulino, Rory Pitman, Rhodri Williams, Steve Shingler, Steff Hughes

14 players listed as unavailable.

Scarlets look to be strugling with injuries and could have 3 no 8 in the backrow.

Ya, Surprised by Scarlets recent slump. I'd expect us to get something from this game with the few lads back. We have been unlucky not to have got the losing bonus last week.
Davies being out of action at 7 seems to be badly missed.

More kicking for territory and more mauls lads and pick and drives. We have the ball carriers and a backrow made up of Masterson at 8 , Hennan at 7 and Mull at 6 with Connoly on the bench.
Come on lads

I would love to see more tactical kicking this weekend.
Combine that with a an improved line out game (let's hope the the pack really fires) and the lads can show some dominance early with a strong maul or two. Scarlets have a mediocre maul defence along with a habit of giving away penalties in their own 22.
It might not be as flashy but it's winter rugby, turn the screw and force the penalties.

RogueXV wrote: It's hard to move beyond past experience. Most of the recent (and maybe not so recent) history goes against Connacht.

I said pretty much exactly this before the Ospreys and Munster games.

This game is kind of a free hit - if we lose, so what, we got nothing last year and still got 31 points from the 10 games we have remaining. We can mix and match over the next few weeks and aim to peak for the return. On the other hand if we win Scarlets are staring down the barrel of an 8 match losing streak when they come to the Sportsground. Pressure's all on them.

It's hard to move beyond past experience. Most of the recent (and maybe not so recent) history goes against Connacht. They've only won 1 of their last 7 meetings against the Scarlets and it looks like they haven't won over there since 2004 and never at Parc Y Scarlets. Admittedly, the Scarlets home form has taken a dip losing 3 of their last 4 there but that is countered by Connacht dropping their last three away games. I'm hopeful for a win and it would make me feel a lot better about their chances of finishing in the top 6 but realistically a LBP would not be the end of the season.

So are we happy to loose before kick off? I would have said the same myself in recent years but I think it's time for these lads to step up and if that means putting on the lantern jerseys again so be it. I really think we can win, maybe I'm dreaming again.

Squad update is out confirming that Robb, Poolman and Connolly are back :lol:

I'm with Borders- a bonus point here and winning (possibly denying them the lbp) week after in Galway would be a huge result for us. That's not to say we can't beat them but they are a very, very tough team to beat at home.

Being honest I would be more than happy to take a losing bonus point out of this and hopefully then beat them in Galway. Scarlets have undoubtedly stumbled in recent weeks but we are in a bit of a rut too. They don't seem to have properly recovered from the Northampton defeat in Europe which was a game they could have won. They took all the time to get past Zebre at home and were very fortunate to win away to Treviso. They played some good stuff against Ospreys and were a bit unlucky.

Scarlets are still a very strong proposition at home and I don't think anyone will forget our nightmare performance over there last season in a hurry which ironically came after a promising opening 10 or 15 minutes.

A win would get us back on track in a big way but getting the better of them or at least breaking even over the 2 games is a realistic objective which we must meet.