Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
CARBERY’S CHANCE TO MAKE MARK
O’gara hails Ireland’s new playmaker
Unites States v Ireland Tonight, 10pm, New York JOEY Carbery has been tipped for the top by the man who holds the record number of points for Ireland. Ronan O’gara has seen enough working closely with the 21-year old in the past two weeks to believe that Carbery is destined for greatness. And he expects the New Zealand-born playmaker to revel in his first start this evening at the Red Bull Arena in New Jersey when Ireland will be expected to maintain their 100% record over the US in nine matches. Carbery has already shown what he can do at this level in the three appearances he has made so far off the bench for Joe Schmidt’s men. O’gara has been working with the Irish squad over the past fortnight and he has been very impressed by what he has seen across the board, but particularly with Carbery. He said: “First of all, you have to remember how young he is and how far he has already come. “I think he’s the kind of player that the more difficult the scenario or picture in front of him the better solution he finds. But he’ll find in test rugby he just has to play the other guys around him. “It’s probably a big statement, but he could progress along the lines of Beauden Barrett. “He gets excited on the ball, while a lot of people panic; he’s the complete opposite, he kicks into turbo mode. I think he has all the attributes. “His kicking game is strong. He has capacity to learn at that age and he has the application to get better. He has that in his drawer. “It’s a case of when you play in Ireland and it’s wet you need that kick, and his restarts are really good. He could add a lot to a team on that alone. “But it’s the same with them all. Usually you can pick out a fella who’s full of himself. There’s none of that here. I think to have the opportunity to see that here every day you kind of go, this team can grow so much because that’s going to be the key for Japan 2019.” Ulster’s Jacob Stockdale will become the latest to be capped this evening when he starts on the left wing but by the close of business at Red Bull Arena there should also be debuts off the bench for Dave Heffernan, Andrew Porter, James Ryan and Rory Scannell. The USA are very much unknown with former Connacht out-half AJ Macginty pulling the strings, while Paddy Ryan could make his debut for his adopted country. The Cork man, who is with Newcastle Falcons, qualifies to play as his mother is American. Five years ago his older brother Dave was also called into the Eagles squad.