Wales Ireland Rugby Live

The issue for Ireland is that if they focus on protecting the wide areas, Wales will be more than happy to run their centres and back-rowers at Gordon D'Arcy and Ronan O'Gara. Brian O'Driscoll's superb instincts in the wide channels should help Ireland cope, while Conor Murray's size should help limit the damage in the middle.

No match this weekend looks more even on paper, or on recent form. The loyal fans of both teams (and both have hordes of them in New Zealand) will believe their favourites are dead-set certainties to win, but those watching from a neutral perspective see it as a close-run thing.