The future of Ireland

The openside thing is being overstated. We had 3 times as long in Wales 22 as they had in ours. Lack of try scoring ability against a tight defence cost us.
An openside gains you posession and slows down opposition posession. Posession was not our problem yesterday.
I won't go down the whole OGara/Sexton side of things (separate thread).
We also have to remember that our centres age cost us at two crucial moments yesterday.
A young faster Darcy gets a proper hit on Philips.
A young faster ODriscoll gets to that ball near the try line without being hit and at least secures posession to setup the next phase.
Two crucial moments - age played a big part.
People are laying too much of this defeat at Sean OBriens door.
The posession stats in their 22 show it was not the problem ... but the whole no. 7 thing is something people are fascinated with stating.

ambid wrote: »

I'm not sure that's the problem. I think we're in for a pretty miserable few six nations if we jettison Ross, DOC, Reddan, ROG, & Darcy.

Eddie O'Sullivan said on Setanta this morning that the IRFU brief the coach each year that the 6N is his priority, even ahead of the RWC. Their reason is that the 6N is their cash cow. Underperformance in the 6N leads to reduced income and reduced interest in the sport if the team perform relatively poorly. The IRFU lose money on the RWC. So the strategic decision from the IRFU is that the 6N is the priority ahead of the RWC.

We need to keep the senior guys, but I hope we start to introduce younger players into the squad. Something remarkable about this Ireland squad is so many of our back up players tend to be older than the first team - both reserve props, Cullen, Leamy & Jennings, Reddan, Wallace, and Geordan Murphy are all the same age or older than the first teamers.

If we are continuing to prioritise the 6N but also plan for the future, we can do that by keeping the bulk of the first team and introducing younger squad players. I'd like to see the bench include guys who we will build the team around in future - so the likes of Hagan, Toner, Ruddock, Keatley, Cave and others.

Change will be gradual. The IRFU believe the 6N is more important to Ireland than the RWC so we can't risk underperformance.

Do you really think the team will be built around those players?

Hagan, yes, he's young and he's a prop that can actual;y scrummage.

But Toner? Never shown international class imo...he's only 2 years younger than Donnacha Ryan and I think Ryan is better. Tuohy's better imo and maybe we'd better trying to develop players like Nagle.

Ruddock has plenty of talent but is he ahead of Dominic Ryan at the moment? And remember Ferris, O'Brien and Heaslip are all fairly young too. And Peter O'Mahony looks promising too.

Keatley will be back-up out-half but he's only 2 years younger than Sexton and a long way off him at this stage. Of course he may improve, he's likely to but it's more likely to be a Sexton/Keatley debate rather than the team being built around him.

And I suppose if BOD, Cave could step up...but there's McFadden/O'Malley/Spence/Fitzgerald as possible contenders for those positions too.

I'd like to see all those players getting a chance, but it's hard to rotate properly, giving everyone a chance internationally in big games so it'll be picked on form.

Fireball07 wrote: »

Do you really think the team will be built around those players?

Dunno. Just used them as examples.

My main point is I'm not sure we can radically change the first team as the 6N is the priority, but we could gradually start introducing the younger guys onto the bench to plan for the future.

Fireball07 wrote: »

Hagan, yes, he's young and he's a prop that can actual;y scrummage.

If Hagan could scrum to the same level as Ross he'd be a far better player. He contributes a lot more around the park.

Fireball07 wrote: »

But Toner? Never shown international class imo...he's only 2 years younger than Donnacha Ryan and I think Ryan is better. Tuohy's better imo and maybe we'd better trying to develop players like Nagle.

I think Nagle and Foley both have a higher ceiling than Toner, but I do believe Toner is more than capable of becoming an international. If he continues his current form he'll be hard to ignore. Tuohy's development has stalled, he's not up to the standard at the moment and he doesn't seem to be getting any closer. If he continues like last season and guys like Tim Barker and now Lewis Stevenson are in the squad ahead of him then I really don't think he'll be playing for Ireland any time soon.

Fireball07 wrote: »

Ruddock has plenty of talent but is he ahead of Dominic Ryan at the moment? And remember Ferris, O'Brien and Heaslip are all fairly young too. And Peter O'Mahony looks promising too.

Ruddock and Ryan play two different positions. I think both will be internationals, although I think Ruddock will spend the majority of his career waiting behind Sean O'Brien or Ferris at while POM and Dippy wrestle for the 7 spot.

Fireball07 wrote: »

Keatley will be back-up out-half but he's only 2 years younger than Sexton and a long way off him at this stage. Of course he may improve, he's likely to but it's more likely to be a Sexton/Keatley debate rather than the team being built around him.

I think we can do far better than Keatley. Hopefully someone else can put their hand up. One of the Ulster lads, or else Madigan could develop himself into a more rounded player.

Fireball07 wrote: »

And I suppose if BOD, Cave could step up...but there's McFadden/O'Malley/Spence/Fitzgerald as possible contenders for those positions too.

I really hope Spence continues to develop beside Marshall, but they're not there yet.


I think the point of the original post is that instead of carrying guys like Cullen and Paddy Wallace as back ups in the squads we should look at blooding younger guys. I think that's a great idea but I do also think the experienced heads who serve as backups in the squad are generally very important to the atmosphere, so I don't know if that'll happen.

And I think we should ALWAYS be trying to win a Grand Slam. 6 Nations should always be our priority. I'd hate to see us ever throw away our chances by using it to throw out youngsters. I'd certainly like to see Summer Tours and AIs used for that though.

davegrohl48 wrote: »

The openside thing is being overstated. We had 3 times as long in Wales 22 as they had in ours. Lack of try scoring ability against a tight defence cost us.

I don't think people are saying we lost this game because we didn't have an openside. The openside debate is just one of a number of selection issues people have with the RWC squad overall. 3 of the 4 teams in the semis have true out and out opensides and all 3 opensides are crucial parts of those teams. So for all the talk over the last while here that the openside position is dead this world cup is proving that not to be the case.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

I'd also like to return to the Heaslip at 7 thing. Heaslip showed in this competition that he would be capable of playing openside. The only tenable difference between 7 and 8 comes at scrum time, when the 7 generally has the most important defensive assignment on the team. Heaslip is certainly quick enough and confident enough in defense to cover any gap he's assigned to there, and confident enough in his ground game to effectively contribute there.

In fact I'd say he'd definitely be more natural in the position than either Ferris or O'Brien. The only problem with the whole concept is positional familiarity and experience at the top level. And not even for Heaslip imo. If Heaslip was to move to 7, then that would mean O'Brien would need to be confident at 8. Seeing as O'Brien has not played 8 at Heineken Cup level I don't think it's something anyone in the Ireland setup would try. The only way for O'Brien to get that experience would be if the switch was made at Leinster meaning Leinster would be dropping Dippy/Jennings. I don't think Leinster want to make that move. I also think Heaslip enjoys playing the position and wouldn't be too happy moving either.

But on paper, I completely disagree with the idea that Heaslip wouldn't make a top class 7. He skills fit the position perfectly.

In this country we seem to have a disorted view of what the openside flanker should be doing in a game mainly due to David Wallace. For years our view was that since Wallace could carry the ball he was automatically our best 7, and any time Jennings got his chance, he didn't carry and people said...Oh Jennings makes no impact. This is where everyone was wrong and foolish, and blind to the true roles of the openside.

In my opinion we had a 7 for years who made the team for his ability to carry, and this was arguably a terrible decision. The role of the 7 in my eyes should be to clear out the ruck in attack, first to the breakdown in defence, link man in attack, and to win turn over ball. WE opted to but a seven in a backrow who wanted to carry, alongside a 6 and 8 who were also ball carrying forwards. Now we're looking to go down the same route with SOB as was done with Wallace. Our best 7 ever, and our only true out and out 7 has been Shane Jennings. But because our perception for years has been Wallace carries and this makes him look a far superior player to Jennings. Wrong! Leinster's success in recent times has mainly been due to Shane Jennings. He came on the Heineken Cup in 2011, and cleaned out the ruck every single time which gave us quick ball, and put us on the front foot. The problem with Ireland is Wallace never cleaned out the ruck because he always wanted to carry, the same can be said with SOB when he's at 7. Jennings is a clean out master, but yet again because he didn't do what Wallace done carried the ball he wasn't classed as a better 7.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

If Hagan could scrum to the same level as Ross he'd be a far better player. He contributes a lot more around the park.

I never said he can scrummage to the same level as him at the moment but even at this stage he's a better option than Court and Buckley.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

I think Nagle and Foley both have a higher ceiling than Toner, but I do believe Toner is more than capable of becoming an international. If he continues his current form he'll be hard to ignore. Tuohy's development has stalled, he's not up to the standard at the moment and he doesn't seem to be getting any closer. If he continues like last season and guys like Tim Barker and now Lewis Stevenson are in the squad ahead of him then I really don't think he'll be playing for Ireland any time soon.

Well all players need gametime to improve while developing, so I suppose if Toner gets more gametime and continues to improve, he's ahead. I haven't seen that much of either of them, but I've always been more impressed with Tuohy.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Ruddock and Ryan play two different positions. I think both will be internationals, although I think Ruddock will spend the majority of his career waiting behind Sean O'Brien or Ferris at while POM and Dippy wrestle for the 7 spot.

I realise that but I just meant for the purpose of including them in the squad, only one of them is realistically going to make the bench at this stage barring injuries (and assuming Wallace isn't included again).

irishbucsfan wrote: »

I think we can do far better than Keatley. Hopefully someone else can put their hand up. One of the Ulster lads, or else Madigan could develop himself into a more rounded player.

I think Keatley has potential to be a very good player. He's not close to international standard yet but I think he could. Hopefully he'll learn from ROG. But Jackson/McKinney will be options further down the line or Madigan either. But I think Keatley will grow into a better player at Munster.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

I really hope Spence continues to develop beside Marshall, but they're not there yet.

Still, I think he has the potential to be a lot better than Cave and would nearly prefer him to be included in squads at this stage.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

I think the point of the original post is that instead of carrying guys like Cullen and Paddy Wallace as back ups in the squads we should look at blooding younger guys. I think that's a great idea but I do also think the experienced heads who serve as backups in the squad are generally very important to the atmosphere, so I don't know if that'll happen.

Oh I agree with the idea too, I was just questioning the players mentioned as players the team would be built around in the future. It really depends on who is getting game time at their clubs continually through the season because I can't see many players making the international team if they're not starting for their clubs (obviously Kidney included Leamy but Leamy did have plenty of international experience). But I do think it might be better if players like Leamy, Wallace, Murphy were displaced for younger players of similar talent.

irishbucsfan wrote: »

And I think we should ALWAYS be trying to win a Grand Slam. 6 Nations should always be our priority. I'd hate to see us ever throw away our chances by using it to throw out youngsters. I'd certainly like to see Summer Tours and AIs used for that though.

I think if it's done gently, it could be good. Throwing them all into 6N games at once won't work (or it's very unlikely to) but 1 or 2 to start, maybe with another 2 or 3 on the bench. But experienced heads on the bench can be vital too. But it's the coach's job to get that balance right. But developing players for the future is very important- I'm sure there are lots of players that could have succeeded at international level if given the chance when they were younger, but missed out.

Interested in Madigan Playing well at moment it seems What are his biggest strengths/weaknesses? We need an up and coming 10 next year

Are there any plans to move to 23 replacements at international level?

Monty Burnz wrote: »

That's a lot of replacements, and a big jump from the current 7.

haha you know what I meant.

Are there any plans to move to 23 man squads at international level?

Podge_irl wrote: »

As long as Court remains the only player capable of covering both sides of the scrum to any real level he's going to be a permanent fixture on the bench.

Hagan looks very good though.

Hagan was very good 9 months ago as well he was just overlooked