RECAP: Wales v Ireland

READERS’ FORUM: Welcome to our coverage of the Six Nations Round One encounter between Wales and Ireland in Cardiff.

What was billed as a new era, following the departure of Warren Gatland, proved to be a tough initiation for Wayne Pivac - as he attempted to instil his own way of playing.

It ultimately proved to be a year to forget for the New Zealander and his side - as they finished fifth in the Championship in 2020, before achieving the same result in the year-end Nations Cup.

* To read our pre-match predictions, CLICK HERE!

* Our live blog will appear below, it might take a little while to load, please be patient. We apologise for the inconvenience!

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Wales: 15 Leigh Halfpenny, 14 Louis Rees-Zammit, 13 George North, 12 Johnny Williams, 11 Hallam Amos, 10 Dan Biggar, 9 Tomos Williams, 8 Taulupe Faletau, 7 Justin Tipuric, 6 Dan Lydiate, 5 Alun Wyn Jones (captain), 4 Adam Beard, 3 Tomas Francis, 2 Ken Owens, 1 Wyn Jones.

Replacements: 16 Elliot Dee, 17 Rhodri Jones, 18 Leon Brown, 19 Will Rowlands, 20 Josh Navidi, 21 Gareth Davies, 22 Callum Sheedy, 23 Nick Tompkins.

Ireland: 15 Hugo Keenan, 14 Keith Earls, 13 Garry Ringrose, 12 Robbie Henshaw, 11 James Lowe, 10 Jonathan Sexton (captain), 9 Conor Murray, 8 CJ Stander, 7 Josh van der Flier, 6 Peter O’Mahony, 5 James Ryan, 4 Tadhg Beirne, 3 Andrew Porter, 2 Rob Herring, 1 Cian Healy.

Replacements: 16 Ronan Kelleher, 17 Dave Kilcoyne, 18 Tadhg Furlong, 19 Iain Henderson, 20 Will Connors, 21 Jamison Gibson Park, 22 Billy Burns, 23 Jordan Larmour.

Referee: Wayne Barnes (England)

Assistant referees: Luke Pearce (England), Alex Ruiz (France)

TMO: Tom Foley (England)