RTÉ rugby analyst Bernard Jackman instances the Welsh set-piece and kicking game as obvious weaknesses as Warren Gatland's side land in Dublin ahead of Saturday's Six Nations encounter.
With limited expectations after a torrid couple of years, Wales have lost two from two against Scotland and England but emerged with some credit from both games, almost pulling off a comeback of surreal proportions against the Scots and leading at Twickenham until the closing stages.
However, with Gatland - who returned to the Welsh post in 2022 after Wayne Pivac's three-year stint - openly acknowledging that Wales are in a rebuilding phase, Jackman indicates that their flaws are too numerous to cope with the Irish team in their current form.
"Their scrum is a weakness, they've chopped and changed their props. Their lineout has been hit and miss," Jackman told Game On on RTÉ2fm.
"Their biggest threat is without the ball, Tommy Reffell, their 7, has had an outstanding tournament so far. They do play fast. And they do play with abandon.
"They probably haven't been together long enough to have a very clear and obvious shape or attack strategy.
"But when they played to their best against Scotland and England - now having said that, England were down to 13 at one stage - they did just move the ball quickly, they took quick taps and played with great tempo.
"Their kicking game is actually very poor. Any time they've gone back to that, it's got them in trouble. Sam Costelow coming in at 10 will give them a little bit better kicking game.
"But I think there's going to big opportunities for Ireland to counter-attack.
"Obviously, if Ireland are sloppy, they can take advantage of that. But if you look at Ireland over the last 21 games, we've been incredibly consistent and pretty ruthless.
"The percentage of games where we get the four-try is bonus is incredible. And that's realistically what the team should be targeting this weekend."
The annual Wales-Ireland ding-dong was ferociously competitive and spiteful during the 2010s, however the spark appears to have dissipated in the rivarly as a period of Irish dominance has taken hold.
The last two matches have finished 28-7 and 34-10 in Ireland's favour respectively and the Welsh arrive in Dublin shorn of any of their prior bullishness.
"It's so hard to see anything other than an Irish win. I was just looking at some of the rankings.
"We're first in tries, carries, running metres, metres gained, post-contact metres, ruck speed, possession, tackle breaks and in line-breaks.
"It's only two games and you could argue about the mindset of France and Italy. But I think we've just carried on from where we were going into the World Cup.
"And for vast periods of the World Cup, we were on fire. The rest of the teams in this competition look to be a little bit off.
"France, talent-wise, should be there or thereabouts but there seems to a big hangover from losing the home World Cup
"And in Wales, Gatland has been very open and transparent, saying this is a total rebuild. Now, there's still some players there that you'd have to respect - Adam Beard, George North, Tomos Williams, Tommy Reffell is outstanding - but there's so much youth around that.
"And probably a lack of belief that they can beat Ireland. These lads never beat Irish provinces when they're full strength."
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Watch Ireland v Wales in the Guinness Six Nations on Saturday from 1.30pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player, follow a live blog on rte.ie/sport and the RTÉ News app and listen to live commentary on RTÉ Radio 1.
Watch France v Italy in the Guinness Six Nations on Sunday from 2.30pm on RTÉ2 and RTÉ Player.
