SCOTT BEMAND HAS expressed his confidence in the abilities of Robyn O’Connor after the uncapped Wexford native was named in Ireland’s starting line-up for their second round Women’s Six Nations clash against Italy at Dexcom Stadium in Galway on Saturday [KO 5.40pm, Virgin Media One, BBC iPlayer].
A part of the Ireland Women’s 7s set-up in recent years, O’Connor first received a call-up to the international 15s squad back in 2024. She also featured for the Ireland U20s during their Six Nations Summer Series in 2025 and more recently scored five tries for the Wolfhounds on the way to their successful defence of the Celtic Challenge.
Despite missing out on the match day 23 for last weekend’s opening round defeat to England in front of over 77,000 spectators at Twickenham Stadium, the Leinster and Old Belvedere star is drafted straight into the starting line-up on the left-wing for her Ireland 15s debut.
“She’s a really tough player. She’s got physicality, change of direction. She’s a great stepper and in the women’s game, that’s perhaps not as prevalent as in the guys. She’s got a great change of direction and that creates attacking moments and opportunities for us either to line break or get some momentum,” the Ireland head coach remarked on a media call earlier today.
“She has a way to the try line and she’s an excellent fielder of a rugby ball. She’s played quite a bit of fullback over her formative years. So anything going up in the air, we know she’s incredibly competent and confident under.
“The Italians bring with them a pretty strong box kicking game. Again, a slightly different challenge. She’s got aerial prowess and she has the ability to sort of dominate that space.”
The addition of O’Connor is one of three changes Bemand has made to his starting 15 for the visit of the Italians to the west. Nancy McGillivray takes over from Eve Higgins at inside centre, while Ruth Campbell is drafted into the second row in place of Dorothy Wall.
Ireland head coach Scott Bemand. Grace Halton / INPHO
Grace Halton / INPHO / INPHO
Higgins and Wall will both feature amongst the replacements for Saturday’s game, along with the fit-again Sam Monaghan and Anna McGann – the latter having bagged Ireland’s first try in the 33-12 loss to England.
Bemand explained that Campbell’s inclusion from the start is well-earned after playing the final 31 minutes in London and he also elaborated on the impact he is hoping to get from his bench players this weekend.
“I thought Ruth did a great job when she came on against England last week. She’d been a bit unlucky the week before, had suffered a little bit of illness, which probably took her out of the running for the start last week. Clearly, having the ability to bring someone like a Doro Wall and Sam Monaghan coming back in to finish the job. That’s a bench that’s got impact.
“Anna’s impact off the bench is undisputed. Anna’s on a really good run of form actually, in terms of she always finds her way to the try line. She’s got capability, she’s six foot. She’s fast, she’s powerful.
“If you have a look at the squad selection this week, you look at the impact that we’re going to get from the finishers coming on across the board. We’ve got, I feel, a really strong impact group that will come on to the pitch. We want that group to take the game up a level.”
Following previous outings in the RDS (Dublin), Virgin Media Park (Cork) and Affidea Stadium (Belfast), Saturday will see Bemand taking charge of Ireland in a home international at a fourth different location.
This will be the first time the side have played a Women’s Six Nations game in Galway, with their only previous fixture in the city being a Test meeting with Canada back in April 2006. Over 8,000 tickets have been sold for the game at the time of writing.
“We’re hunting down that 10,000 people, giving us the extra player. We understand how this can feel a bit different. Again, we said last week, it needs to become an energising factor rather than a daunting factor,” Bemand added.
“We’re pretty excited to get there and bring the green wave to Galway. We’re excited for it to be a record crowd. Hopefully we can show that what we’ve done in training worked hard this week and we get that fast start that we’re after.”