Wales' most troubling Irish collapse happened on Friday night as insiders say situation is 'worst its ever been'

If Wales’ defeat at senior level against Ireland was worrying, what happened in Cork the night before was arguably even more concerning again.

Ireland crushed Wales 53-5 in the U20 Six Nations.

They scored eight tries but could have crossed for more. The team in red missed 27 tackles, gave away 20 penalties and made a dozen handling errors.

Like their senior side a day later, Ireland were very good.

But that will only partly console Wales.

Nor is it anything new.

Wales lost heavily three times in last year’s U20 Six Nations — 40-12 to Ireland, 36-19 to France and 45-3 to England — and have finished in the bottom three in the table in each of the past four seasons.

By contrast, in the 10 campaigns up to and including 2017, they were out of the top half of the table just twice, with a Grand Slam and two second-place finishes on their record sheet.

Something has gone wrong. Seriously wrong.

Euros Evans, director of rugby at Coleg Sir Gar, who have developed countless players for the Scarlets and Wales over the years, said the pattern of results couldn’t be dismissed.

“The results speak for themselves,” he said.

“We are not competing. You get good crops of players and bad crops, but that always happens. It’s not the basis on which to base a successful development model.

“Maybe there’s something else at play. Are there as many male players playing the game in Wales as there were 10 years ago? I don’t have the data, but my suspicion is there isn’t. And it matters. If you have 100 players playing and five percent are good, then you have five good players. If there are fewer people playing, then it stands to reason there’ll be fewer high quality players coming through. It’s not rocket science.

“I can think of only two