Generation game Farrell returns to an Ireland side who must prove they remain a real force

One minute we're winding the clocks back an hour, the next we're hurtling forwards into rugby's maddest month.

- Robert Kitson

Welcome to the whistle-stop world of the Autumn Nations Series which, this year, has arrived as abruptly as a cat burglar in the Louvre. Sides that take time to settle into familiar old routines are about to experience a short, sharp shock.

Of course there is the flip side: the main southern hemisphere powers have been smashing away at each other for weeks and certain individuals must be slightly weary. In terms of cohesion and collective readiness to pick up where they left off last time out, however, there is barely a comparison.

Which is why there will be a certain nervousness in one or two union offices in Dublin and Twickenham.

Organising extra high-profile Tests outside the official window in a British & Irish Lions year to balance the books comes with a health warning. If your national team don't immediately hit the November turf running any semblance of feelgood factor can dissolve rapidly.

Not least, potentially, in Ireland. This week should be all about basking in former glories as they prepare to take on New Zealand in Chicago. Ah, Chicago. What a sweet home from home it was nine years ago when, for the first time in 111 years of tackling New Zealand, the boys in green beat the All Blacks. A packed Soldier Field, standing tall opposite the haka in an iconic figure-of-eight formation to honour Anthony "Axel" Foley; the memories remain indelible.