BY RICHARD BULLICK
PROUD Ulsterwoman Neve Jones will lead Ireland for the first time in Saturday’s final World Cup warm-up match against Canada (12 noon, BBC2) with the fact that the match is taking place at her home provincial Affidea stadium being the icing on the cake.
There is a real local theme to Ireland’s leadership for this send-off fixture in Belfast because Brittany Hogan has been named as vice-captain of her country for the first time, having effectively filled the role for part of last week’s win against Scotland in Cork.
The pair have been elevated due to the concerning absence of one of Ireland’s co-captains Edel McMahon, while the other, Sam Monaghan, begins on the bench here having made a welcome comeback from a long injury lay-off in the Scottish clash.
Jones, who will be winning her 37th cap, and her Gloucester Hartpury team-mate Monaghan have actually been named as co-captains but, with the latter not starting, the Ballymena native is set to skipper the side from the off.
The 26-year-old represented Ireland at this spring’s Six Nations launch and, as designated vice-captain, she took responsibility for liaising with the referee the last time the team played in Belfast, against France in late March.
On that occasion, with official captain McMahon beginning on the bench, Amee-Leigh Costigan was stand-in skipper but because she is out on the wing a long way from the heart of the action, Jones was mandated to communicate with the ref on her behalf.
Ulster lock Fiona Tuite starts in the second row in a run-on line-up showing 10 changes from the 27-21 victory over Scotland, while two of her provincial colleagues, prop Sadhbh McGrath from Donegal and Fermanagh flanker Claire Boles, are on the bench.
Ireland Player of the Year Aoife Dalton, who along with hooker Jones and Aoife Wafer made the official 2025 Guinness Six Nations Team of the Championship, is back in the green No 13 jersey she wore for all 400 minutes this spring.
Like Dalton, first-choice fullback Stacey Flood makes her first appearance of the summer having sat out the opening warm-up match as does scrumhalf Aoibheann Reilly along with winger Anna McGann and lock Ruth Campbell.
Having been on the bench initially last week, last season’s regular front row trio of Niamh O’Dowd, Jones and Linda Djougang have been restored to the starting line-up here along with Tuite and Dalton’s centre partner Enya Breen.
Ireland supremo Scott Bemand has again gone with a 6:2 split on a bench which includes both of last week’s starting locks, Monaghan and Eimear Corri-Fallon, who also made her return against Scotland after missing all of last season’s Tests due to injury.
The only survivors in the starting line-up from Musgrave Park are fit-again star winger Beibhinn Parsons, outhalf Dannah O’Brien and the entire back row of Player of the Match against Scotland Grace Moore, last week’s debutant Ivana Kiripati and Hogan.
That is partly due to the enforced absence of openside McMahon, who led Ireland on her own all of last season with Monaghan missing but hasn’t been able to take part in either of these World Cup warm-up matches.
With both Erin King and Dorothy Wall already ruled out of the entire tournament and taliswoman Wafer in a race against time to be fit for the World Cup, concerns over experienced campaigner McMahon’s knee must be another headache for boss Bemand.
Bemand is a huge fan of Kiripati and handing her the No 7 jersey for the second week running – this time against the team ranked second in the world – suggests the Connacht loose forward, who turned 22 on Wednesday, is right in the frame for the World Cup.
She has been chosen here instead of giving the versatile Deirbhile Nic a Bhaird – who scored Ireland’s fifth and final try against Scotland – a run at openside or Celtic Challenge title-winning Wolfhounds skipper Claire Boles.
However, even being named on the bench is a considerable boost for Paris Olympian Boles, who featured in Ireland’s last two Six Nations matches this spring but then wasn’t included in the initial World Cup preparation panel, albeit she was injured coming into the summer.
Neither Munster back five forward Jane Clohessy, who won her first cap as a replacement against Scotland at the end of April, nor Shannon Ikahihifo of Ealing Trailfinders have had the chance to take the field during either of these warm-up matches.
First capped in the 2024 Six Nations, New Zealand-born Ikahihifo wasn’t involved with Ireland this past season due to injury, but was recalled to the squad for this summer’s training camps and has remained in the mix.
Along with Monaghan, Corri-Fallon and Boles, the other forwards on the bench are McGrath – who scored a try against Scotland on her first start at tighthead – veteran hooker Cliodhna Moloney-McDonald and the uncapped Ellena Perry.
As previously revealed by Local Women Sport, former England player Perry – who won 11 caps for the Red Roses up until 2020 but qualifies for Ireland through her maternal grandfather and is eligible under World Rugby rules – has been brought into the Irish set-up.
Perhaps surprisingly, Ireland had named just five props in their World Cup preparation squad despite expectations that they would at least consider taking six to the tournament, but the addition of Perry hasn’t been officially confirmed up until now.
The 27-year-old, a team-mate of Jones and Monaghan at three-in-a-row English Premiership champions Gloucester Hartpury, will win her first Ireland cap this weekend and has a real chance of going to the World Cup, especially with Christy Haney injured at present.
The American-born Haney, who missed Ireland’s WXV1 campaign last autumn due to injury, has had to sit out the warm-up programme with a hamstring problem and it remains to be seen whether the popular Leinster tighthead is fit for the World Cup.
Perry coming in for last Saturday’s starting loosehead Siobhan McCarthy is the only personnel change to the six front row forwards on duty against Scotland, albeit that McGrath, who turns 21 later this month, and Moloney-McDonald of Exeter Chiefs revert to the bench here.
Campbell and Tuite normally alternated as Wall’s second row partner during the Six Nations but started together in the engine room against Scotland at the end of April with Wall deployed at blindside flanker that day.
Compared to the matchday squad in Cork, there are two personnel changes to the slate of back five forwards for this weekend, with Campbell and Boles replacing Nic a Bhaird and Connacht teenager Ailish Quinn, who won her first cap against Scotland.
Olympian Flood returns in the No 15 jersey in place of Virgin Media Park try-scorer Maebh Deely, who is now nailed on as her fullback understudy with Munster’s Aoife Corey – who started against Scotland at the end of the Six Nations – already cut from the squad.
A hat-trick hero against Italy in the Six Nations, McGann comes in on the left wing for recent Irish sevens skipper Costigan, who took over the on-field captaincy last week following Monaghan’s scheduled withdrawal before half-time.
It makes sense to give Parsons another outing following her long lay-off and McGann was due a run but the writing may now be on the wall for the World Cup chances of Wicklow Olympian Vicky Elmes-Kinlan.
Perhaps surprisingly, Elmes-Kinlan had edged ahead in the winger pecking order of Katie Corrigan, a try-scorer aged just 18 in all three home matches of the 2024 Six Nations, and started against Scotland at Hive Stadium in late April.
But that wasn’t a particularly convincing outing in Edinburgh and it seems likely that Ireland will leave out the extra winger to facilitate the inclusion in the World Cup 32 of a fourth specialist centre in newcomer Nancy McGillivray.
Part of England’s extended training squad and on an RFU contract until the end of June, McGillivray – who has an Irish father and Thai mother – switched her allegiance to Ireland last month and scored a try on debut in the win against Scotland.
McGillivray drops out of the matchday squad this week to accommodate the outstanding Dalton’s return while her excellent centre partner at Virgin Media Park Eve Higgins swaps places with Breen, who began on the bench in her native Cork.
Higgins had worn the green No 12 jersey for the first three matches of this year’s Six Nations before Breen partnered Dalton against Wales and Scotland, with both being good options in an area of strength for Ireland.
Stacey Flood, pictured with young fans at Ravenhill, returns at fullback for the Canadian game
With O’Brien again selected at outhalf, and Breen providing cover this time from within the starting team – with Flood as additional back-up if needed – the squad’s other specialist stand-off Nicole Fowley won’t have got any game-time ahead of the World Cup.
Fowley’s Connacht halfback partner Reilly will relish the opportunity to start against Canada having appeared, perhaps surprisingly, to slip to third in the pecking order behind Molly Scuffil-McCabe and Emily Lane as this year’s Six Nations progressed.
Not included in last weekend’s matchday squad, Reilly comes in for Scuffil-McCabe at the base of the scrum with Lane continuing on the bench, so possibly Bemand – a former scrumhalf himself – sees the latter as more an impact player and the others as starters.
Canada inflicted Ireland’s only defeat at last autumn’s WXV1 tournament, but the 21-8 scoreline on that occasion certainly didn’t flatter the team in green, for whom two yellow cards predictably proved costly.
One of those sinbinned was Djougang, the most capped player in the present squad, who will draw level with assistant coach Larissa Muldoon’s mark of 48 Ireland appearances when she takes the field in Belfast.
Muldoon and Fowley both featured last time Ireland faced Canada on home soil, when the visitors inflicted a 48-7 defeat at Belfield Bowl on their hosts in November 2016 little more than 18 months after the girls in green had been crowned Six Nations champions.
It will be a tough fixture for Ireland again this weekend, but Bemand will want a strong performance from his team the day before finalising his World Cup squad, which will be announced next Monday morning.
Ireland’s opening group game is against Japan in Northampton on August 24 and they are back at Franklin’s Gardens to play Spain seven days later before the crunch clash with world champions New Zealand in Brighton on September 7.
This Saturday will be a very proud day for Old Belvedere RFC, with the Dublin club providing no fewer than five of the Ireland pack – O’Dowd, Djougang, Campbell, Tuite and Hogan – along with Dalton and O’Brien behind the scrum.
IRELAND (v Canada): Stacey Flood; Beibhinn Parsons, Aoife Dalton, Enya Breen, Anna McGann; Dannah O’Brien, Aoibheann Reilly; Niamh O’Dowd, Neve Jones (capt), Linda Djougang, Ruth Campbell, Fiona Tuite, Grace Moore, Ivana Kiripati, Brittany Hogan. Replacements: Cliodhna Moloney-McDonald, Ellena Perry, Sadhbh McGrath, Eimear Corri-Fallon, Sam Monaghan, Claire Boles; Emily Lane, Eve Higgins.
Ulster lock Fiona Tuite starts this Saturday after a big performance off the bench against Scotland
Wolfhounds skipper Claire Boles from Fermanagh will have a chance to stake her World Cup claim
Parma hat-trick hero Anna McGann returns on the wing for Ireland’s match against the Canadians
