Ireland World Cup SquadOrdering coffees and pastries in Edinburgh airport at around 6 p.m., Eddie O'Sullivan, Brian O'Brien, Declan Kidney and Niall O'Donovan sat around a table and went into conclave. Nobody went near them. Flying back ahead of the players, they booked into Jury's Towers Hotel. It would be 4 a.m. before they said goodnight.

It was sometime after 9 p.m. when the meeting to select the Irish squad formally began, as the quartet first reviewed the videos of Friday night's Celtic League matches between Leinster and Munster and Neath/Swansea Ospreys and Ulster. Ultimately it took them seven hours to finalise the 30-man Irish squad for the World Cup, and the absence of David Wallace especially and Leo Cullen will generate most discussion.

The phone-calling began in the morning. Nine of those not selected were contacted over telephone by O'Sullivan, though, some, he admitted, left their phones turned off. The rest, grateful not to hear a ring, heard of their selection when it became public at 11 a.m.

"I can safely say I've had no breakfast yet. It's one of the most difficult things you ever have to do. It's bad enough leaving a player out of a test game, but to leave a player out of the World Cup is harrowing. There were some very disappointed men this morning and to their credit they all took it on the chin," said O'Sullivan.

Cogent, thoughtful and articulate as ever in all his responses, at this point O'Sullivan's voice cracked for a second.

Such is the nature of these things that omissions tend to raise eyebrows more than selections, and none more than the non-selection of Wallace, all the more so in light of the decision to go with six back row players in a 17-13 split between forwards and back.

Any residual effects from Wallace's shoulder operations last season were not a factor, according to O'Sullivan, and despite another try-scoring display on Saturday, clearly in the coach's eyes Wallace hadn't done enough in the last month to make up for ground lost last season.

"That particular position in the back row was going to be incredibly, incredibly competitive. It was that and everything that I said it would be. Unfortunately, someone had to lose. The sad part about it is that if David's name was in there, somebody else's wouldn't be and we'd be having the same discussion about somebody else."

Not that the debating ended there, the broken leg and torn bicep sustained by Geordan Murphy and Rob Henderson in the 24 hours before selection perhaps only complicating matters. Certainly, Murphy's versatility, as well as his sheer class, will be missed - Girvan Dempsey is left as the only specialist full back in the squad - while elsewhere there were a number of tight calls.

Frankie Sheahan, unsurprisingly, edged out Paul Shields as one of three hookers; prop Simon Best gets in ahead of Emmet Byrne; while Cullen lost out to Gary Longwell and Donncha O'Callaghan in the second row, "an extremely difficult call", O'Sullivan conceded.

Neil Doak was chosen ahead of Brian O'Meara as third scrumhalf while Anthony Horgan edged out more experienced rivals such as Justin Bishop (curiously overlooked in the three recent tests) for the last wing slot.

"I think I can say with hand on my heart that every sector of the team was difficult, maybe not in the first two or three positions, but in the final positions," said O'Sullivan. "But the really tough calls were in the back five of the pack."

Overall though, O'Sullivan reiterated that he is happy with his squad. "We now can focus more on the World Cup. The pressure of being in or out of the squad comes off them. But this can't be the top of the mountain, getting into the World Cup squad. This is base camp. The top of the mountain is a long way in front of us but I think they'll be looking forward to the climb."

Again referring to Ireland's pool as "the group of death", O'Sullivan said: "Our goal is to get out of that group, then we're into a knockout situation. That's when the tournament really begins, because anything is possible over 80 minutes. But you don't get to think about that until you actually achieve it. So for us we think about nothing now but getting out of our pool and take it from there."

John Hayes, Shane Horgan and John Kelly, all currently injured, will not travel with the rest of the squad to Bilbao on Tuesday for a week of warm-weather training - instead continuing their rehabilitation in Dublin - while Gordon D'Arcy, Tyrone Howe and Justin Fitzpatrick will supplement that squad.

Squad members will be available for one or two games for their provinces, as well as a one-off game between an Irish President's XV and an under-25 selection on the weekend of the Celtic Cup, when Ulster and Munster have byes in the first round.

Backed to the hilt by the Union, after a final camp in Ireland the squad will depart for Australia on September 29th in readiness for their opener against Romania, in Gosford on October 11th, and will be accompanied by a 16-strong management staff.

Ireland Squad

Backs: Girvan Dempsey, Anthony Horgan, Shane Horgan, John Kelly, Denis Hickie, Brian O'Driscoll, Kevin Maggs, Jonathan Bell, David Humphreys, Ronan O'Gara, Peter Stringer, Guy Easterby, Neil Doak.

Forwards: Reggie Corrigan, Marcus Horan, John Hayes, Simon Best, Keith Wood, Shane Byrne, Frankie Sheahan, Malcolm O'Kelly, Gary Longwell, Paul O'Connell, Donnacha O'Callaghan, Simon Easterby, Victor Costello, Eric Miller, Keith Gleeson, Alan Quinlan, Anthony Foley