So Ye got Murphy - Happy?

LuckyLloyd

All the rubbish I have been listening to the past few weeks about what a disgrace it was that we weren't playing Murphy; we needed more attacking flair; blah, blah, ****ing blah.

So he played. And he couldn't deal with the highball when it mattered. And he made poor decisions going forward. And HE WAS NOT GOOD ENOUGH OVERALL. And it made me miss Dempsey like never before.

I'm fuming with today's game for many various reasons. So this little "I told ya so" eases my frustration somewhat.

GBX

Murphy didnt have a bad game. He was taken out of it a few times. The team improved but werent good enough. Not his fault.

Valentia

LuckyLloyd wrote:

All the rubbish I have been listening to the past few weeks about what a disgrace it was that we weren't playing Murphy; we needed more attacking flair; blah, blah, ****ing blah.

So he played. And he couldn't deal with the highball when it mattered. And he made poor decisions going forward. And HE WAS NOT GOOD ENOUGH OVERALL. And it made me miss Dempsey like never before.

I'm fuming with today's game for many various reasons. So this little "I told ya so" eases my frustration somewhat.

Nonsense.

ongarite

Pure bull. Where were Hickey and Horgan to support him when he tried to run it from deep. Nobody up to help Murphy on the ground, no wonder he got turned over so much.

Irish Wolf

What more would Dempsey have offered?

jayteecork

We could have had anyone in at Full back and it wouldn't have made one iota of a difference.

Snickers Man

ongarite wrote:

Pure bull. Where were Hickey and Horgan to support him when he tried to run it from deep. Nobody up to help Murphy on the ground, no wonder he got turned over so much.

Never mind Hickey and Horgan. Where was the pack?

Answer: Standing upfield waiting for him to kick the ball beyond them and follow it up. That's what they did all the time so they must have been told to do it.

It's clear our game plan was to force the opposition to kick the ball into touch thereby giving us an attacking line out. We're good from those situations. Trouble is, we've been good at it for years and the world knows that so opposition teams have decided quite simply not to give us lineouts in their half.They simply don't kick the ball to touch, they kick them at our back three, who have been told to kick it forward.

Our forwards know that and instead of running back to support the catcher, they hang around upfield waiting for him to kick it. When the catcher finally gets frustrated by the ping pong and decides to take the ball into contact, his forwards were not expecting it and are slow to get back and support. That was a big reason why Argentina and Georgia before them appeared to win the breakdown more often.

Want to see how to deal with a deep ball? Consult the oracle, namely the great NZ v France semifinal of 1999. Advance the slider to 19mins, or just a few seconds before. Note who the catcher (Lamaison) passes to. Benazzi the second row. (And at the risk of going on like a cracked record, can you spot which dreadlocked winger Dominici runs past as if he wasn't there?)

No reason why Ireland couldn't have done that if they'd simply been organised enough to do it.

bing3

Murphy didnt have his best game today but it was far from bad. Missed a couple of high catches (usually a strong point) due to some good chasing and poor communication between fielders. Took try well, going forward made poor decisions because noone ran any supporting lines. The way Boss (and someone else?) turned away from his breakout 10 minutes from time was disgraceful and symptomatic of the malaise in the Irish team.
Happy we got him? There really isnt much between himself and Dempsey but he certainly warrants inclusion on the team ahead of players like Trimble and Duffy.

Killme00

LuckyLloyd wrote:

All the rubbish I have been listening to the past few weeks about what a disgrace it was that we weren't playing Murphy; we needed more attacking flair; blah, blah, ****ing blah.

So he played. And he couldn't deal with the highball when it mattered. And he made poor decisions going forward. And HE WAS NOT GOOD ENOUGH OVERALL. And it made me miss Dempsey like never before.

I'm fuming with today's game for many various reasons. So this little "I told ya so" eases my frustration somewhat.

Lloyd, This is crap, murphy was one our better players today.

Diarmuid

LuckyLloyd wrote:

I'm fuming with today's game for many various reasons. So this little "I told ya so" eases my frustration somewhat.

but totally misplaced. Murphy didn't have a bad game and played much better than many others on the pitch.

GreenHell

LuckyLloyd wrote:

All the rubbish I have been listening to the past few weeks about what a disgrace it was that we weren't playing Murphy; we needed more attacking flair; blah, blah, ****ing blah.

So he played. And he couldn't deal with the highball when it mattered. And he made poor decisions going forward. And HE WAS NOT GOOD ENOUGH OVERALL. And it made me miss Dempsey like never before.

I'm fuming with today's game for many various reasons. So this little "I told ya so" eases my frustration somewhat.

Thats just stupid.

uRbaN

Murphy only missed one high ball as far as I remember....

zAbbo

LuckyLloyd, does it make you feel better, that even if we had of had Christian Cullen (in his prime) it wouldn't have made any difference ?

All this 'I told ya so' is bollox, fans were crying out for options, changes to be made, shake up the XV.

We were let down in this world cup, by the management, the IRFU, the players and in some cases the fans.

davyjose

LuckyLloyd wrote:

HE WAS NOT GOOD ENOUGH OVERALL.

Who was??????

Linford

I always favour Dempsey over Murphy, but Dempsey would have made little difference yesterday. Murphy played ok and if Dempsey had been fit, Murphy should have been on instead of Horgan or Hickie...

LuckyLloyd

Meh,

1) I wasn't exactly sober posting that last night.

2) It is badly written and doesn't help to underline my point.

3) I had a point: while Murphy was not the worst player on the pitch; he didn't exactly dominate the game and give us some sort of unreal attacking force. And you must all have short memories of the kind of outcry we saw on this board the past two weeks. Screaming and shouting that it was "unbelievable" and "a disgrace" that Murphy wasn't playing for Ireland in place of Dempsey at fullback.

Murphy missed three high balls in the first half yesterday. And he stupidly overcooked a couple of up and unders. And overall, he did nothing of real note when collecting the ball deep in Irish territory.

Of course, yesterday's result was not his fault. But that is not the point I am trying to make. I am simply noting that the one thing EOS did have correct in this world cup was starting Dempsey at fullback - and that Murphy is not the mystical knight in shining armour that he was made out to be by some corners of the media and public.

nacho libre

He should be in on the wing before the likes of Trimble. Dempsey is the better option at full-back.

tampopo

I agree with Lloyd,

there werw calls for him to be played for weeks and weeks. And he did drop three balls.

We won't know if Dempsey would have dropped them, but the Argentinian winger and full back didn't drop many.

Diarmuid

tampopo wrote:

There werw calls for him to be played for weeks and weeks.

As a winger. No one was claiming that Dempsey was playing badly, however Trimble/Horgan/Hickey were not exactly shining.

tampopo wrote:

And he did drop three balls.

So what was his success rate? I'd say he caught at least 12 and the ones he "dropped" were ones he was challenging one on one for.

tampopo wrote:

but the Argentinian winger and full back didn't drop many.

they were not tested as severely as Murphy was. How many Garryowens did they have to catch?

Punchbowl

Fact is, he did score a try. He didn't do bad overall, and in fairness he was up for taking risks. Not the returning hero we expected, but he did contribute to a much better performance from the team.

marco_polo

LuckyLloyd wrote:

Meh,

1) I wasn't exactly sober posting that last night.

2) It is badly written and doesn't help to underline my point.

3) I had a point: while Murphy was not the worst player on the pitch; he didn't exactly dominate the game and give us some sort of unreal attacking force. And you must all have short memories of the kind of outcry we saw on this board the past two weeks. Screaming and shouting that it was "unbelievable" and "a disgrace" that Murphy wasn't playing for Ireland in place of Dempsey at fullback.

Murphy missed three high balls in the first half yesterday. And he stupidly overcooked a couple of up and unders. And overall, he did nothing of real note when collecting the ball deep in Irish territory.

Of course, yesterday's result was not his fault. But that is not the point I am trying to make. I am simply noting that the one thing EOS did have correct in this world cup was starting Dempsey at fullback - and that Murphy is not the mystical knight in shining armour that he was made out to be by some corners of the media and public.

This must be the most petty threads I have read in a long long time. Murphy was one of Irelands better player yesterday in fairness. Not sure what you were expecting of him TBH, was he supposed to win the game on his own.

Not for a minute do I think he had a brilliant game but by and large he was reasonably effective and did more good than bad things in the game. He was the only one of the back three that looked to take the the ball back to the Argies, 0% of the time both wingers looked like they didn't want to know about it. While Hickie did it once or twice during the game, Horgan ran the ball back exactly 0 times, if it wasn't for being offside for ROGs cross kick I would have even though he was playing. Some of Murphys kicking wasn't the greatest and at time he looked in two minds about what to do but at least he took on the responsibility to take the game back to Argentina.

tampopo wrote:

I agree with Lloyd,

there werw calls for him to be played for weeks and weeks. And he did drop three balls.

We won't know if Dempsey would have dropped them, but the Argentinian winger and full back didn't drop many.

As for the dropped balls it has to be said that some of those Hernandez garryowens were of the highest quality and the contrast with lame Irish efforts (a number of which Murphy was responsible for) was staggering, there were times when the kick chasers were practically standing beside Murphy waiting for the ball to come down. In contrast the Argie fielders were under no pressure when fielding the ball.

As Dempsey is probably the finest fielder of the high ball in world rugby I have no doubt he would probably have caught at least one or two of them even under that kind of pressure from the chasers. I soubt he would have been any better on the counter attack than Geordan. Would it have made one blind bit of difference to the result who played, the answer is no.