O'Gara

CathalMc · 13-03-2008 11:28pm

I think these statistics are a bit more informative.

O'Gara is having a poor 6 nations by some accounts. As I said before, I believe he more than measures up to others in his position.

IrishRugby.ie: TOP SCORERS' LISTS - 2008 SIX NATIONS:

After the first four rounds (February 2-March 9)

POINTS SCORERS:

50 Jonny Wilkinson (England)
43 Ronan O'Gara (Ireland)
35 James Hook (Wales), Chris Paterson (Scotland)
34 Stephen Jones (Wales)
....
10 Tommy Bowe (Ireland), Jean-Baptiste Elissalde (France), Toby Flood (England), Paul Sackey (England), David Wallace (Ireland)
9 Dan Parks (Scotland)
8 Damien Traille (France)
5 Girvan Dempsey (Ireland), Anthony Floch (France), Cedric Heymans (France), Marcus Horan (Ireland), Yannick Jauzion (France), Rob Kearney (Ireland), Julien Malzieu (France), Lionel Nallet (France), Mike Phillips (Wales), Simon Picone (Italy), Aurelien Rougerie (France), Tom Shanklin (Wales), Simon Webster (Scotland), Richard Wigglesworth (England)
....

TRY SCORERS:

5 Vincent Clerc (France), Shane Williams (Wales)
3 Lee Byrne (Wales), Martin Castrogiovanni (Italy)
2 Tommy Bowe (Ireland), Toby Flood (England), Paul Sackey (England), David Wallace (Ireland)
1 Girvan Dempsey (Ireland), Anthony Floch (France), Cedric Heymans (France), James Hook (Wales), Marcus Horan (Ireland), Yannick Jauzion (France), Rob Kearney (Ireland), Julien Malzieu (France), Lionel Nallet (France), Mike Phillips (Wales), Simon Picone (Italy), Aurelien Rougerie (France), Tom Shanklin (Wales), Simon Webster (Scotland), Richard Wigglesworth (England)

GOAL KICKERS:

16 Ronan O'Gara (Ireland), Jonny Wilkinson (England)
13 Stephen Jones (Wales)
12 James Hook (Wales), Chris Paterson (Scotland)
7 David Bortolussi (Italy)
5 Jean-Baptiste Elissalde (France), Dimitri Yachvili (France)
4 Andrea Marcato (Italy)
3 Damien Traille (France)
2 Dan Parks (Scotland)
1 Morgan Parra (France), David Skrela (France)

PLACE-KICKING STATISTICS:

100% James Hook (Wales) (12 out of 12), Chris Paterson (Scotland) (12 out of 12), Morgan Parra (France) (1 out of 1), David Skrela (France) (1 out of 1)
86% Stephen Jones (Wales) (13 out of 15)
84% Ronan O'Gara (Ireland) (16 out of 19)
83% Dimitri Yachvili (France) (5 out of 6)
77% David Bortolussi (Italy) (7 out of 9)
72% Jonny Wilkinson (England) (16 out of 22)
66% Andrea Marcato (Italy) (4 out of 6), Dan Parks (Scotland) (2 out of 3)
60% Damien Traille (France) (3 out of 5)
55% Jean-Baptiste Elissalde (France) (5 out of 9)

Crash · 14-03-2008 4:55am

CathalMc wrote: »

I suspect, the "weak link" is a popularly recited meme, so the Irish 10 channel is targeted more frequently and this type of thing is self-propagating.

I do think you have to call a spade a spade, the irish 10 channel is a weak spot. Much like under someone like michalac the 10 channel was a weak spot etc. etc. etc. - its perfectly fair to state that. However, whenever the 6 nations or the world cup rolls around, this forum has a habit of hyperbole - its what makes it interesting

Amazotheamazing · 15-03-2008 8:05pm

I'd like to add today's game to O'Gara's list of wilting under pressure. He didn't seem to bother coming out after half time, but of course, world class etc.

Junior · 15-03-2008 8:05pm

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

I'd like to add today's game to O'Gara's list of wilting under pressure. He didn't seem to bother coming out after half time, but of course, world class etc.

Did anyone else on that team ? No.

Amazotheamazing · 15-03-2008 8:07pm

Are we discussing other people on the team?

Fine, O'Gara is crap in pressure games along with a good amount of players. Hope you treasure this moment.

marco_polo · 15-03-2008 8:45pm

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

I'd like to add today's game to O'Gara's list of wilting under pressure. He didn't seem to bother coming out after half time, but of course, world class etc.

Nice to see you don't let the facts get in the way of a good troll. Bar a few missed penalties he had a good game today. Considering we hardly touched the the ball in the second half what do you expect of an out half?

Amazotheamazing · 15-03-2008 8:53pm

marco_polo wrote: »

Nice to see you don't let the facts get in the way of a good troll. Bar a few missed penalties he had a good game today. Considering we hardly touched the the ball in the second half what do you expect of an out half?

no, he had a good first half. we had plenty of ball in the second half, only O'Gara, mastermind, kept passing it to horgan and other dead-end alley heros.

marco_polo · 15-03-2008 8:57pm

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

no, he had a good first half. we had plenty of ball in the second half, only O'Gara, mastermind, kept passing it to horgan and other dead-end alley heros.

True enough, it was criminal the way he ignored Murphy, D'Arcy and O' Driscoll every time we had the ball in hand.

bleg · 15-03-2008 9:14pm

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

no, he had a good first half. we had plenty of ball in the second half, only O'Gara, mastermind, kept passing it to horgan and other dead-end alley heros.

he can only play with what's in front of him

Amazotheamazing · 15-03-2008 9:23pm

Or, maybe, just maybe, he could have varied the game and tried skip passes, brought Fitz in off his wing, kick a bit, chip behind for players to run on to.

I know, I know, expecting and outhalf and captain to call out how the game will be played is something successful teams do, not what Ireland bother with.

Amazotheamazing · 16-03-2008 2:21am

Have just seen the stats of the Ireland-England game, of all the players, English and Irish, O'Gara made the most mistakes, making him the Irish player with the most errors for the tournament. If this is world class, no wonder we lose.

sioda · 16-03-2008 4:36am

But then we have to give ROG credit Amazo of all the times ROG has slotted kicks in the past Welford road in the rain being my top memory.

His play from hand or boot in any of the Thomond Park Heino games

can you link the stats??

Amz · 16-03-2008 10:28am

Who gives a toss about Heineken Cup games when he's not performing at present at international level? Those Heineken Cup games a) only matter to one set of fans in this country and b) are in the past.

People on this forum have been crying out for O'Gara to be captain of the national side for some time now, he got his chance and I think we all saw yesterday what he was capable of ...

if O'Gara deserved plaudits for his performance yesterday and during this championship I'd be the first to give them to him, but it was quite apparent during the game yesterday that he was incapable of captaining under pressure. Now maybe it's because on the international scene all of the fans at the games don't believe the sun shines out of his arse, which would obviously make the atmosphere less pressurised, but he's a professional and should be able to deal with it.

Everyone wanted him to do well yesterday, but it was quite obvious that he was sticking to Eddie's master plan and had no ideas of his own. Some of his passes were shocking yesterday, for someone who is lauded as being a great passer of the ball it wasn't apparent.

There were so many times when quick ball out to the wings was what we needed, skipping the midfield would have been a good idea at times, we had forwards clogging up that area at times and it prevented us from perhaps exploiting space that we could have exploited. As out-half and more importantly as Captain O'Gara should have been a little more glic in his decision making in that area.

In all he performed poorly in this champion, his one great tackle was against Sebastian Chabal was how many years ago? Yet he seems to be living on that tackle with some people still.

When he plays well he's super, but he's not playing well and our national team is suffering as a result. Yes others performed poorly, but this thread is about O'Gara and I expected more from our captain.

I'm finding it hard to imagine how he will redeem himself with Irish fans. He has a long way to go.

sioda · 16-03-2008 10:32am

I never thought ROG would be a good captain for Munster or Ireland but he is a top class standalone player

bugler · 16-03-2008 11:03am

I'm actually aghast at this thread.

bleg · 16-03-2008 1:25pm

Amz wrote: »

if O'Gara deserved plaudits for his performance yesterday and during this championship I'd be the first to give them to him, but it was quite apparent during the game yesterday that he was incapable of captaining under pressure.

clermont auv match away? a game where munster's season was on the line? probably a bit more pressure on him there than in a 6 nations game that meant **** all.

Stev_o · 16-03-2008 2:10pm

But who else is there? Answer is no one he dont have ANY fly halves up to international standard and the closest one we have is Dunne and most people will object to his inclusion because he plays for Connaught.

So until we have some one who can step up to the plate without us being murdered we have to stick with ROG.

gjim · 16-03-2008 2:19pm

People on this forum have been crying out for O'Gara to be captain of the national side for some time now,

Please provide some evidence for this. Otherwise, it's fairly obvious your provincial bias is making you delusional.

I wish you and the other provincial fundamentalists would go away. This forum, even if not particularly busy, was always worth a visit because most of the contributors seemed to have the ability to be some way objective when it came rugby.

The national side has a bad run and now it's full of idiots who are lining up to defend their provincial heros or attack players from other provinces.

davyjose · 16-03-2008 3:19pm

Stev_o wrote: »

But who else is there? Answer is no one he dont have ANY fly halves up to international standard and the closest one we have is Dunne and most people will object to his inclusion because he plays for Connaught.

So until we have some one who can step up to the plate without us being murdered we have to stick with ROG.

It's incredible - the crusaders have a better back-up fly-half than we do. For such an important position it is a shame on the IRFU that we don't have any quality FH's. I could understand a lack of tight-head props or Blindside flankers, but this is the position evry kid wants to play.

phog · 16-03-2008 4:16pm

Amz wrote: »

Who gives a toss about Heineken Cup games when he's not performing at present at international level? Those Heineken Cup games a) only matter to one set of fans in this country and b) are in the past.

People on this forum have been crying out for O'Gara to be captain of the national side for some time now, he got his chance and I think we all saw yesterday what he was capable of ...

if O'Gara deserved plaudits for his performance yesterday and during this championship I'd be the first to give them to him, but it was quite apparent during the game yesterday that he was incapable of captaining under pressure. Now maybe it's because on the international scene all of the fans at the games don't believe the sun shines out of his arse, which would obviously make the atmosphere less pressurised, but he's a professional and should be able to deal with it.

Everyone wanted him to do well yesterday, but it was quite obvious that he was sticking to Eddie's master plan and had no ideas of his own. Some of his passes were shocking yesterday, for someone who is lauded as being a great passer of the ball it wasn't apparent.

There were so many times when quick ball out to the wings was what we needed, skipping the midfield would have been a good idea at times, we had forwards clogging up that area at times and it prevented us from perhaps exploiting space that we could have exploited. As out-half and more importantly as Captain O'Gara should have been a little more glic in his decision making in that area.

In all he performed poorly in this champion, his one great tackle was against Sebastian Chabal was how many years ago? Yet he seems to be living on that tackle with some people still.

When he plays well he's super, but he's not playing well and our national team is suffering as a result. Yes others performed poorly, but this thread is about O'Gara and I expected more from our captain.

I'm finding it hard to imagine how he will redeem himself with Irish fans. He has a long way to go.

Amz you're all over the place - where ROG has done good it's either for his province or in the past - all games are in the past when you're reviewing a guys performance, the 6Ns is now in the past.

Not sure how many were"crying out" for ROG to be captain - yeah a lot said BOD wasn't a good captain myself included but you'll find it very hard to find a post from me suggesting a particular player for captain as I'm sure that I haven't posted one.

You talk about him sticking to Eddies master plan - how many times has BOD changed a game plan during a game?

As for his passing yesterday - there was a stat put up towards the end of the game that he passed over 70% of the time but we hadn't a decent centre yesterday so we made few line breaks.

You seem to have the opinion that a player gets one chance if this is the case why have we still got Bernard Jackman on the team he got his chance and blew it if that's your view.

You say you're finding it hard to see where he will redeem himself or is it maybe just maybe it's because you never really wanted ROG there in the first place.

Amz · 17-03-2008 2:45am

bleg wrote: »

clermont auv match away? a game where munster's season was on the line? probably a bit more pressure on him there than in a 6 nations game that meant **** all.

I don't give a toss about Munster, when he puts on the green jersey he's representing Ireland, if he's not going to put 100% into it then he doesn't deserve to be there. It's just unfortunate that he is one of the myriad of Irish players who are never under pressure for their spot in the team.

gjim, get off the cross. I've been posting on this forum before you joined boards, for a large period of my posting here I never stated what province I was in as I felt it shouldn't matter as I always did my damndest to remain unbiased. This thread is about Ronan O'Gara, who plays for Munster, who was representing Ireland at the weekend and during this championship, now I can't help that fact, but as an Irish fan I don't feel the need to defend my provincial affiliations when I comment on a player. When you start a thread about another player from any province and I feel the need to participate in that thread to pay homage or to express disappointment it wont matter a damn to me what province, or club they play for.

When a man is picked to play for Ireland he should be there because he will put 100% into all aspects of his performance.

Phog, this thread is about O'Gara, so I stuck to talking about O'Gara, I'll quite happily discuss other players and lack of performance from them in another thread. I'm not sure why you're taking my comments about O'Gara so personally, I don't believe I said you wanted O'Gara to be captain so why you're defending yourself is beyond me.

I'm not sure of what your point is about his passing stat. He said prior to the game that he was going to pass a lot, I'm talking about the quality of his passing, yes we were lacking decent centres, but again this thread is about O'Gara not the centres.

I'm by no means of the opinion that a player gets one chance and one chance only, I think again you're taking what I said far too personally. I didn't call for O'Gara to be dropped, I didn't call for his head on a platter, I was merely stating I was disappointed in his performance both as an outhalf and as a Captain.

gjim · 17-03-2008 5:28am

gjim, get off the cross. I've been posting on this forum before you joined boards, for a large period of my posting here I never stated what province I was in as I felt it shouldn't matter as I always did my damndest to remain unbiased. This thread is about Ronan O'Gara, who plays for Munster, who was representing Ireland at the weekend and during this championship, now I can't help that fact, but as an Irish fan I don't feel the need to defend my provincial affiliations when I comment on a player.

What are you talking about? I simply don't remember loads of demands for O'Gara to be given the captainship and I asked you to back up the claim that there had been, that's all. If you can't, don't do an Eddie on it and try to weasel your way out of it.

As for provincial bias, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure someone who posts here exclusively giving out about Munster players or exclusively giving out about Leinster players (guess which category you fall into to?), is provincially biased. I'm not asking you to give up your support of your province but I don't see you putting the same energy into attacking the performances of the Leinster players who have played poorly during the 6 nations. Where's your Horgan or Jackman is sh*te thread? Objective sure. :rolleyes:

Like the one-eyed idiots who've waited in the grass for years before gleefully sticking the boot into BOD or who almost enjoyed seeing any Leinster player do poorly just so they could say they knew it would happen, there are others who've waited for the opportunity to attack Munster players on the team. It's sad really.

gcgirl · 17-03-2008 1:20pm

gjim wrote: »

What are you talking about? I simply don't remember loads of demands for O'Gara to be given the captainship and I asked you to back up the claim that there had been, that's all. If you can't, don't do an Eddie on it and try to weasel your way out of it.

As for provincial bias, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure someone who posts here exclusively giving out about Munster players or exclusively giving out about Leinster players (guess which category you fall into to?), is provincially biased. I'm not asking you to give up your support of your province but I don't see you putting the same energy into attacking the performances of the Leinster players who have played poorly during the 6 nations. Where's your Horgan or Jackman is sh*te thread? Objective sure. :rolleyes:

Like the one-eyed idiots who've waited in the grass for years before gleefully sticking the boot into BOD or who almost enjoyed seeing any Leinster player do poorly just so they could say they knew it would happen, there are others who've waited for the opportunity to attack Munster players on the team. It's sad really.

here here !

Amz · 17-03-2008 2:04pm

It's actually "hear hear".

thirtyfoot · 17-03-2008 9:14pm

Amz wrote: »

It's actually "hear hear".

Amz you seem to be drifting from your this thread was about O' Gara who plays for Munster and represents Ireland and focusing on gcgirl's spelling:D Maybe you could start a new thread on gcgirl's spelling instead of discussing it hear, or should that be here?

komodosp · 18-03-2008 12:33am

Well England saw him coming a mile off anyway, most of his kicks to touch - while aimed brilliantly - were caught by wingers / FB. And I know sometimes one would deliberately miss touch so as to put pressure on the opposition to do something with it, but that pressure doesn't really happen if there is someone there waiting for it...

As for his passing... while brilliant some times, he can be a bit inconsistent...

Eoin · 18-03-2008 1:11am

I don't know how anyone outside of the Irish squad and management can comment on who should be captain. It's not always about being the best player, or the loudest, or the annoying arse on the team who does the whole head slapping thing before a game. I bet that not many people would have picked Reggie Corrigan as the Leinster Captain for 4 seasons.

The captain has to be guaranteed his place on the team, and by that measure, O'Gara does qualify. Personally I think he is over-rated; his kicking game is great and he produces some magic moments, but his soft defence and lack of speed lets him down too much. He is a very good player, but world class?

bleg · 18-03-2008 1:30am

he was the logical choice for captain when you had the injured captain saying that o gara really got the team motivated for the french game.

ireland approached the game very well in the 1st 20 mins (weird i know) but then faded away due to lack of confidence. sounds plausible to me.

O'Gara

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