Cian and Sam Prendergast will both start for Ireland in their opening Nations Championship with Australia on Saturday (11.10am Irish time).<\/p>\n
In a squad which features four changes from the starting 15 which defeated Scotland in the final round of the Six Nations, the Kildare brothers get the starting shirts with Caelan Doris and Jack Crowley sidelined through injury.<\/p>\n
Dan Sheehan captains the side from hooker with Tom O’Toole at loosehead prop, and Tadhg Furlong on the tighthead side. Joe McCarthy and James Ryan pack down in the second-row meaning Tadhg Beirne will have to make do with a place on the bench.<\/p>\n
Cian Prendergast, Josh van der Flier and Jack Conan round out the pack in the back-row.<\/p>\n
There is an all Leinster half-back pairing with Sam Prendergast and Jamison Gibson-Park once again starting together while Ulster’s Stuart McCloskey is fit to start at centre alongside Garry Ringrose.<\/p>\n
Jamie Osborne deputises on the left wing with Tommy O’Brien ruled out and James Lowe no longer in the squad, while Robert Baloucoune and Hugo Keenan finish the side.<\/p>\n
Ronan Kelleher, Jeremy Loughman and Tom Clarkson are among the replacements with Beirne and Nick Timoney making up the five forwards with Craig Casey, Ciar\u00e1n Frawley and Bundee Aki as backline cover.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, Wallabies head coach Joe Schmidt has handed a fresh start to full-back Jock Campbell who is in line to play his first test in over 1300 days on Saturday.<\/p>\n
In the pack, former Ulster prop Angus Bell starts at loosehead prop while Harry Wilson captains the side from number eight.<\/p>\n
Ryan Lonergan and Carter Gordon start together at nine and ten for the first time while superstar Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii partners Len Ikitau in the centres.<\/p>\n
Australia: Jock Campbell; Max Jorgensen, Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii, Len Ikitau, Dylan Pietsch; Carter Gordon, Ryan Lonergan; Angus Bell, Josh Nasser, Allan Alaalatoa; Jeremy Williams, Josh Canham; Rob Valetini, Fraser McReight, Harry Wilson (capt).<\/p>\n
Replacements: Brandon Paenga-Amosa, James Slipper, Taniela Tupou, Lachlan Shaw*, Tom Hooper, Tate McDermott, Ben Donaldson, Tom Wright.<\/p>\n
Ireland: Hugo Keenan; Rob Baloucoune, Garry Ringrose, Stuart McCloskey, Jamie Osborne; Sam Prendergast, Jamison Gibson-Park; Tom O’Toole, Dan Sheehan (capt), Tadhg Furlong; Joe McCarthy, James Ryan; Cian Prendergast, Josh van der Flier, Jack Conan.<\/p>\n
Replacements: R\u00f3nan Kelleher, Michael Milne, Finlay Bealham, Tadhg Beirne, Nick Timoney, Craig Casey, Ciar\u00e1n Frawley, Bundee Aki.<\/p>\n
Referee: Ben O’Keefe (NZRU)<\/p>\n
Follow a live blog of Australia v Ireland on Saturday from 11.10am on RT\u00c9.ie\/sport and the RT\u00c9 News app.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cian and Sam Prendergast will both start for Ireland in their opening Nations Championship with Australia on Saturday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":528805,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,43],"class_list":["post-528804","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528804","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=528804"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/528804\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/528805"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=528804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=528804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=528804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}