'We're our own team' - Farrell not worried about trophyless four provinces

Ireland head coach Andy Farrell says he's not reading too much into the Irish provinces' disappointing end to the rugby season, ahead of the upcoming tour of New Zealand.

Farrell revealed his 40-man squad this morning, with five uncapped players among the group; Leinster trio Ciarán Frawley, Jimmy O'Brien and Joe McCarthy, Munster's Jeremy Loughman and Connacht's Cian Prendergast.

The squad are currently gathering at the IRFU high performance facility in Abbotstown for a three-day mini-camp, before they depart for New Zealand next week, ahead of their opening match against the Maori All Blacks on Wednesday 29 June.

The mood around Irish rugby has dampened in the last couple of weeks after a disappointing end to the season for the provinces, with Leinster and Ulster edged out in the URC semi-finals last week.

In both games, as well as Leinster's Champions Cup final defeat to La Rochelle, the game was won and lost by physicality and a dominant setpiece, and despite a combined 27 of the 40 players coming from those two provinces, Farrell says he's not overly concerned about the common trend of those recent defeats.

"We're Ireland, we're our own team," the head coach said.

"We play our own way and we've come up against big teams before and been unbelievably physical.

"Physicality is not just about fronting up, it's how you play the game and how you get opportunities to create space to be able to get over the gainline and be able to be aggressive in the right parts of the game.

"I think we've done pretty well of late in that type of scenario, so no, it doesn't affect us at all."

And Farrell says he's taking the positives from having extra access to his Leinster and Ulster players.

"But what this three-day camp is, is making sure that