Rob Howley has claimed Wales “have not become a bad team overnight” after naming an unchanged side to face Ireland on Friday night.
The Wales coach has resisted any alterations to the 23-man squad that lost 29-13 against Scotland – a defeat which means Wales have won seven of their last 19 matches.
Howley said: “Friday night is an opportunity for us. There is a lot of experience in our group and you don’t become a bad team overnight. We want to show what we can do and that experience will be very important this week.”
Flanker Justin Tipuric is set to win his 50th cap in the unchanged team for Friday’s Six Nations game in Cardiff.
Tipuric, with the number seven jersey, will line up alongside Sam Warburton and Ross Moriarty in the back-row as Wales seek to put two successive defeats behind them.
“We felt it was important the same group of players had the opportunity to go out and perform on Friday so we have named an unchanged match-day squad,” added Howley.
Wales lost 21-16 at home to England and 29-13 to Scotland at Murrayfield. They need to win one of their remaining two Six Nations matches to stay in the top eight of the World Rugby rankings and avoid falling into the third pot for the 2019 Rugby World Cup draw on May 10.
Wales were ranked ninth when the draw was made before the last World Cup, in England in 2015, and ended up with the hosts and Australia in their pool, finishing in second place before losing to South Africa in the quarter-finals.
“We know we need to be more clinical and we need to execute better under pressure and we have been working hard on that during the last few weeks,” said Howley.
“Ireland are one of the in-form sides in world rugby and are coached very well and packed with experience and there are a number of interesting match-ups across both teams.”
“We always say we are fortunate to have the best supporters in the world and we are eager to put in a performance for them under the lights at Principality Stadium on Friday.”
Wales: 15-Leigh Halfpenny; 14-George North, 13-Jonathan Davies, 12-Scott Williams, 11-Liam Williams; 10-Dan Biggar, 9-Rhys Webb; 1-Rob Evans, 2-Ken Owens, 3-Tomas Francis, 4-Jake Ball, 5-Alun Wyn Jones (captain), 6-Sam Warburton, 7-Justin Tipuric, 8-Ross Moriarty.
Replacements: 16-Scott Baldwin, 17-Nicky Smith, 18-Samson Lee, 19-Luke Charteris, 20-Taulupe Faletau, 21-Gareth Davies, 22-Sam Davies, 23-Jamie Roberts.
