Taylor Swift and Declan O'Rourke contending for Number 1 on the Official Irish Albums Chart

Taylor Swift races out of the gates towards her sixth chart-topper, and is tailed by Declan who hopes to claim his highest-charting album ever.

Huge new entries from Taylor Swift and Declan O'Rourke are to impact this week's Official Irish Albums Chart.

Swift's rerecording of her second studio album Fearless and O'Rourke's seventh record Arrivals occupy the Top 2 spots on today's Official Irish Albums Chart sales flash, based on physical sales, downloads and streams from the past weekend.

Taylor Swift's Fearless (Taylor's Version) is currently in the lead, on course to become her sixth Irish Number 1 album following Red (2012), 1989 (2014), Reputation (2017), Lover (2019) and Folklore (2020). Her second surprise album of 2020 Evermore peaked at Number 2.

MORE: Taylor Swift's Official Irish Singles Chart history - the numbers behind her success in Ireland

Following his performance on RTÉ One's The Late Late Show last Friday, O'Rourke's Arrivals is on track to become the highest-charting of his career, in at Number 2 midweek. His previous best peak was Number 3 logged by 2016's In Full Colour.

Fearless (Taylor's Version) has the most downloads and album streams so far this week, while Arrivals has accumulated the most combined physical sales (CD + vinyl). But who will come out on top at the end of the week?

This week's final Official Irish Singles and Albums Charts will be published on OfficialCharts.com/Ireland at 3pm on Friday. Listen to the chart every Friday on RTÉ 2FM with Bláthnaid Treacy at 7pm.

© IRMA