You could put it down to two P’s – personnel and pattern. I have huge admiration for Warren Gatland and very few of the problems facing Welsh rugby today can be attributed to him. Some of his recent selection calls have been both baffling and costly, however, and nobody else can be blamed for that. Leaving Gloucester duo Gareth Anscombe and Max Llewellyn out of the initial squad raised many eyebrows, and for good reason. Anscombe’s absence saw Cardiff’s Ben Thomas – an inside centre – start at 10 for the first two games of the tournament. Thomas acts as out-half cover for his club side when they are in dire straits. He is not a natural 10, let alone a test level operator in that position, and Gatland’s insistence on playing him there despite his unsuitability for the role was unfair on both him and his teammates. The difference Anscombe made on Saturday was telling. Despite the element of rustiness and sloppiness that permeated the Welsh backline at times – something I would primarily put down to a lack of cohesion – having a natural 10 there marshalling proceedings and making consistently good decisions with the ball in hand is a fundamental cornerstone no team can do without. He didn’t light the place up all afternoon but for a guy who had not started for his country in six years, he showed enough quality to remind us why he deserves to be there. Centre Max Llewellyn has scored seven tries in 11 games for Gloucester in the Premiership this year. At 6’5 and 109kg, he is no shrinking violet and adds an element of physicality the Welsh backline badly needs now that George North and Alex Cuthbert are no longer in the picture. He wasn’t his destructive best on Saturday but still put in a solid display and his record at club level tells us he will only grow into this role with more exposure to test match rugby. Llewellyn’s eligibility is an interesting case study of the convolution of what is known as ‘Gatland’s Law’. Introduced by Gatland himself in 2017, it initially dictated that only players with 60 caps or more could ply their trade abroad and remain eligible for the national side. This was reduced to 25 caps after review in 2023 but there is a loophole within that, of which Llewellyn is currently the beneficiary. You do not need to be playing in Wales to get your first cap but if a Welsh region makes you an offer at the end of your existing contract, failure to move back to Wales at that point will render you ineligible for selection. As Llewellyn was already a Gloucester player when he was called into the World Cup training squad in 2023, there was no issue with him being selected at the time. His original contract is due to expire this summer and it will be interesting to see what happens at that point. He is probably already earning significantly more than any of the Welsh regions could offer him and his stock will have risen dramatically over the course of the season. If it comes down to it, will he turn his back on a pile of money to keep representing his country, or vice versa? It’s a bit of a Sophie’s Choice situation and one I would not envy the 26-year-old having to make. I understand the logic behind the existence of the rule and agree with the principle, but the arguments in favour of it have been significantly weakened by the financial precarity of the professional game in Wales. I understand the figures being offered to young players have reduced so dramatically since 2022 that it has become much more difficult to justify turning down the opportunities to play abroad when they come. One player Wales will be hoping to keep within the borders for as long as possible is aforementioned winger Ellis Mee, who made his international debut on Saturday. Mee was playing for mid-table outfit Nottingham in England’s second tier this time last year. He was spotted by former Scarlets flanker James Davies and only made his URC debut in September. Another of the nine changes made by Sherratt, 21-year-old Mee had a few stutters but ultimately, slotted seamlessly into an elusive and multi-faceted attacking pattern as part of an all-Scarlets back three. We had not seen Wales attack like this in a long time and as James Lowe said in his post-match interview, they had the Irish defence chasing shadows for periods of the match. There was nothing complicated about it but the consistency of the shape and the options given to the Welsh playmakers were what made it so effective and difficult to defend. Nearly every time Wales got outside Ireland, it was a result of them having multiple options off the same microplay in the same phase. That sounds like a lot of rugby buzzwords, so let me explain what I mean. The traditional shape in phase play we see every week is a pod of three forwards set up off nine (or 10) with a receiver (a back) behind that pod as an option. Ireland have started to show a four-man pod sometimes but three is still the prevailing number. The forwards are set up in an arrowhead shape. Let’s call it carrier, a plus on his outside and a minus on his inside. Generally speaking, the nine will hit the carrier who will carry the ball himself, give it out the back to the receiver or occasionally, tip it on to the plus outside. Ideally, if you do give it out the back, you will have another forward or two running a hard line off that receiver, with yet another back behind them as an option. The forwards running these hard lines sit the defenders down as they have to respect their inside shoulders. After all, defenders can’t afford to guess whether the man in front of them is going to receive the ball or not – they have to deal with the threat in front of their face. Most sides can do the first part easily but struggle to marry that with the correct shape outside. Wales managed to do this well throughout the entire game and used the full variety of options they had at their disposal to manipulate Ireland’s defence and keep them guessing. A good illustration of how well Wales ran this was Tom Rogers’ try in the 43rd minute. It’s rare you see it being executed so accurately, let alone against a side of Ireland’s quality. Wales gather a dropped ball, move it wide and end up just inside the Irish 22. Tomos Williams hits hooker Elliot Dee as the carrier. Dee tips it on to his plus, WillGriff John, who steams on to the ball with a good line and gets go forward ball. Williams then hits Anscombe who has a pod of three forwards outside him. The forwards look like real options but Anscombe goes straight out the back to Ben Thomas. Toby Faletau now comes into the equation, coming from wide to run a hard line off Thomas. Full back Blair Murray is busting his ass to work around from the inside and be another option out the back of Faletau. He doesn’t even get there in time but Sam Prendergast, who is the second last defender in the Irish line, now has two options in front of him to defend. He has to respect the hard line from Faletau but in doing so, it costs him the fraction of a second he needs to get close enough to Murray. If you watch the clip of this back you can see how marginal the difference is. Prendergast must make the slightest readjustment of his feet to respect Faletau and Murray is just out of his grasp by the time he is free to get him. If Faletau stays out wide waiting for a pass, this is an easy defensive read. He works hard to be an option because he knows it’s his job to sit someone down, something that could well pay dividends in this part of the pitch. Murray then shows great pace and poise to attack the space and forces Lowe to come in, before putting Rogers away in the corner for a beautiful finish. It’s the kind of attacking rugby any team would be happy with and we must remember this was a group of players – particularly a backline – that was not very familiar with one another, being steered by a coach in his first week of the job. There were plenty of unforced handling errors which, I hope, will be significantly reduced in the coming weeks. Obviously, Wales’ problems have not been solved by one 80-minute outing but the quality of their attack, combined with the solidity of their set piece, mean there is plenty to be encouraged about.