Hines to Leinster.

Orizio

Link.

thomond2006

WOW.

Who saw that coming? :D

That's a great signing for Leinster, no doubt about it.

themont85

Interesting signing.

subfreq

Great signing.

Amazotheamazing

I dunno, I seriously dislike the way he walked out on his previous team-mates, loyalty obviously means nothing to him.

chupacabra

Does this signal the retirement of big Mal?

thomond2006

chupacabra wrote: »

Does this signal the retirement of big Mal?

Hmm, that's what I thought.

Hopefully this won't hinder Devin Toner's development.

Max Power1

USAP : Nathan Hines part au Leinster




Le deuxième ligne de l'USAP, l'Ecossais Nathan Hines doit rejoindre le Leinster (Champion d'Europe) la saison prochaine.
Arrivé au club en 2005, le 2e ligne international écossais est actuellement en tournée avec l'équipe des Lions Britanniques et n'a pas participé aux phases finales pour cette raison.


Plus d'informations demain dans votre édition locale de L'Indépendant.

Envoyez à un ami | Imprimez

Anglais sil vous plait?? (i do not speak the francais)

Amazotheamazing

The USAP second row, Nathan Hines will be joining the European Champions, Leinster next season. He arrived in the club in 2005, the Scottish second row is currently touring with the British Lions and therefore did not take part in the final part of the season.

More information in your local edition of the Independent tomorrow.

Send to a friend/print.

thomond2006

The 2nd row of Perpignan, Scot Nathan Hines will join Leinster (European Champions) next season.

Arrived at USAP in 2005, currently touring with the Lions, he did not play in the French play-offs for that reason.

Edit: Je suis trop tard!

Stev_o

Toner will be kicking himself if this is true.

Amazotheamazing

thomond2006 wrote: »

Edit: Je suis plus tard!

Trop tard, n'est pas?

duckysauce

red card city

thomond2006

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

Trop tard, n'est pas?

Oui, vous avez raison, mon ami.

Higher LC French, eh? :D:D

Nothingcompares

french called them the british lions...

Max Power1

duckysauce wrote: »

red card city

wtf

duckysauce

guys a yellow red card machine smile at him and he will deck you ps mind your language the mods dont tolerate much around here

Max Power1

erm... ok?

I stand by my original question.. WTF?

Orizio

duckysauce wrote: »

guys a yellow red card machine smile at him and he will deck you ps mind your language the mods dont tolerate much around here

Translation: 'he gives away a lot of penalties and sin binnings'.

anonymous_joe

Nothingcompares wrote: »

french called them the british lions...

I'm boycotting that newspaper from now on.


Interesting signing, quite happy really. Mal's getting old, and we've needed a guy who can cover second row and six.

[Jackass]

Je pense que c'est une signature manafique! Il ajoutera beaucoup d'agression à l'équipe de Leinster!



I think it's great...it's a very powerfull Leinster forward unit now and also very balanced:
1. Healy
2. Jackman
3. Van Der Linde
4. Cullen
5. Hines
6. O'Brien
7. Jennings
8. Heaslip

With back up of Wright, Fogarty, Hogan, Toner & Cullen. Cover in the backrow is still very thin though with only really McLoughlin and Keogh...and you'd imagine all 3 Leisnter back row players would be off with the Irish squad come 6 nations time.

He offers great aggression...Mal & Toner are both superb line out operators, but around the pitch, perhaps don't offer as much as they could with respect to carries and tackle count / aggressive work at the break down. Hines does this in spades and Toner can learn a lot from him. I don't think it should be a given that players get straight in JUST because they're Irish (all though I am of course in favour of as many Irish players starting as possible), but it would be no harm for Toner to keep fighting for his place and also learning from a guy like Hines in the process....perhaps something he wouldn't learn off other guys in the squad.

You can see what foreign signings have done for Leinster...I think Healy has learned a MASSIVE amount off CJ, but in particular Ollie and O'Brien and Heaslip I'd imagine learny a great deal off Rocky and his style of play...Contepomi was a massive influence on Sexton, and Hines can offer this to Toner.

I'm very pleased with it anyway...I think it spells the end for Hogan a lot more than it does for O'Kelly...who must surely be in his final season now. Hines is no spring chicken either though at 31 (same as Cullen I think?) ... so in a couple of seasons the cover at second row could turn very thin...just something to keep an eye on for Leinster I suppose...there's no obvious second row coming through other than Toner afaik.

EdgarAllenPoo

I'd say they brought him in for a few reasons, Mal is getting on,Toner is still green around the gills and Leo Cullen is really really injury prone. I'm sure ROG will love playing against him all the time in the Magners league now.

zAbbo

He can play a bit at blindside if needed, bit of a hard nut alright.

Another Aussie, no Randwick connection though

CJ, Newcewa, Stan, Berne and Hines are the 5 foreigners which makes it unlikely Leinster will get a top class replacement.

Trojan

I'm very much in two minds about this. Could bring some parts of the Elsom factor back: hard hitting, aggressive tackling and carrying.

On the other hand he could bring a ton of penalties and yellow cards.

We'll see what happens. I'm cautiously optimistic.

d'Oracle

Do not want.

Devon Toner needs games.

EdgarAllenPoo

zAbbo wrote: »

He can play a bit at blindside if needed, bit of a hard nut alright.

Another Aussie, no Randwick connection though

CJ, Newcewa, Stan, Berne and Hines are the 5 foreigners which makes it unlikely Leinster will get a top class replacement.

Is Cameron Jowitt still around?

fifth

Wow, never saw this coming!

Probably a good signing

ALH-06

zAbbo wrote: »

CJ, Newcewa, Stan, Berne and Hines are the 5 foreigners which makes it unlikely Leinster will get a top class replacement.

You mean Leinster won't be allowed to sign another foreigner?

GDM wrote: »

Is Cameron Jowitt still around?

Hopefully not! He won't be needed now, especially with Hines coming in.

zAbbo

GDM wrote: »

Is Cameron Jowitt still around?

I think so, and he's Irish qualified at this stage.

[Jackass]

Jowitt's gone. Don't know where, but he's not in the squad for next season.

garbanzo

A good player is Hines but it is odd when you consider they have been grooming Toner. Anyway, that's his problem now !

Allez les Bleues;)

conf101

ALH-06 wrote: »

You mean Leinster won't be allowed to sign another foreigner?

But seeing as he's qualified to play for Scotland does he count as a foreigner?

Depp

no due to eu employment regulations

ch2008

is this being reported anywhere more official than eh...france?

anonymous_joe

conf101 wrote: »

But seeing as he's qualified to play for Scotland does he count as a foreigner?

There's a difference between foreign and Irish qualified.

Someone like Shane Geraghty for example, is eligible for an Irish passport, but because he's played for England would always be NIQ as far as I know.

Zzippy

[Jackass] wrote: »

I think it's great...it's a very powerfull Leinster forward unit now and also very balanced:
1. Healy
2. Jackman
3. Van Der Linde
4. Cullen
5. Hines
6. O'Brien
7. Jennings
8. Heaslip

With back up of Wright, Fogarty, Hogan, Toner & Cullen....

Cullen must be some man to play 4 and provide cover on the bench too! :P

Real FM

1 ticket to Belfast booked in the name of Trevor Hogan please.

EdgarAllenPoo

I'd say Hogan will be off to Connacht at this rate, only reason he seems to have to keep playing is his annual holiday to America during the Churchill Cup.

Real FM

Yeah it's a pity, he was showing some good potential up until the last world cup - but he's still not a bad player. I don't think Hines is really necessary. With 3 stong experienced second rows to rotate I think it would have been a great way to develop Devin Toner.

Another import brought in by the IRFU that isn't really needed.

[Jackass]

Zzippy wrote: »

Cullen must be some man to play 4 and provide cover on the bench too! :P

My bad!! Meant O'Kelly

stephen_n

Yes he's a good addition to the Leinster squad but once again it seems to be a detrimental signing in terms of the advancement of irish rugby i.e. Toner, so not entirely happy about this one!

anonymous_joe

stephen_n wrote: »

Yes he's a good addition to the Leinster squad but once again it seems to be a detrimental signing in terms of the advancement of irish rugby i.e. Toner, so not entirely happy about this one!

Yes and no. Hines will definitely be playing for the international breaks.

Leo Cullen realistically is the third best second row based in Ireland (not sure whose better between him and Casey) and could be called up for the internationals. Mal's probably finished as an international, so that means Toner will get lots of 'A' games and a fair few ML games.

Also, he'd be an interesting player to bring off the bench, could be tough to stop in the last 10 or 20 minutes of a game.

Amazotheamazing

anonymous_joe wrote: »

Leo Cullen realistically is the third best second row based in Ireland (not sure whose better between him and Casey) and could be called up for the internationals.

Not so sure about that, Cullen and MOD are much of a muchness, solid players but some distance off POC and DOC, younger players like Ryan and Caldwell have much more potential than either Cullen or MOD. Don't rate Casey as an International player at all, he's too slow. I'd expect Caldwell and Ryan to start appearing in Ireland squads ahead of Cullen, MOD and Casey this season.

Wonder will the Ospreys make something out of McInerney?

anonymous_joe

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

Not so sure about that, Cullen and MOD are much of a muchness, solid players but some distance off POC and DOC, younger players like Ryan and Caldwell have much more potential than either Cullen or MOD. Don't rate Casey as an International player at all, he's too slow. I'd expect Caldwell and Ryan to start appearing in Ireland squads ahead of Cullen, MOD and Casey this season.

Wonder will the Ospreys make something out of McInerney?

I dunno, Cullen captained Leicester. I think he's seriously underrated by a lot of people. He was injured for a lot of last season, and you really noticed it. He's a fantastic player.

Knowing Uncle Deccie, he will of course pick MOD over someone with talent, so it's not likely that Caldwell or Ryan will be starting. In reality, the differenence between the likes of Casey, O'Connell, Cullen, O'Callaghan and O'Driscoll isn't really massive. (Not even mentioning O'Kelly.) They're all very very good players. So it's hard to tell who he'll go with. And sure, of the above mentioned, O'Connell, Cullen and Bob Casey are all captains of some of the bigger teams in the NH. So it's very tough to pick any of 'em as especially astounding. For my money, I reckon O'Connell's the best of that bunch, followed by Cullen, but that's just me. I also reckon that O'Callaghan's in some ways underrated by Munster and Ireland fans.

Amazotheamazing

anonymous_joe wrote: »

I dunno, Cullen captained Leicester. I think he's seriously underrated by a lot of people. He was injured for a lot of last season, and you really noticed it. He's a fantastic player.

Knowing Uncle Deccie, he will of course pick MOD over someone with talent, so it's not likely that Caldwell or Ryan will be starting. In reality, the differenence between the likes of Casey, O'Connell, Cullen, O'Callaghan and O'Driscoll isn't really massive. (Not even mentioning O'Kelly.) They're all very very good players. So it's hard to tell who he'll go with. And sure, of the above mentioned, O'Connell, Cullen and Bob Casey are all captains of some of the bigger teams in the NH. So it's very tough to pick any of 'em as especially astounding. For my money, I reckon O'Connell's the best of that bunch, followed by Cullen, but that's just me. I also reckon that O'Callaghan's in some ways underrated by Munster and Ireland fans.

I dunno, O'Driscoll has probably captained Munster more times than Cullen captained Leicester, I wouldn't read much into it.

If Cullen had been fit for the full season, he might have played his way onto the Irish bench, but he's not a workhorse like DOC (who has freakish stats for a second row) so he would have to overtake POC to get gametime with Ireland. With respect to him, he's not on the same level as O'Connell, who's probably the finest second row in Europe at the minute.

If you want to drop DOC, you need to need to find someone who'll replace his workrate, none of the other second rows really offer this, imo.

faigs

Good signing, but yea I would be worried for Toner - hope he doesn't get p*ssed off and leave like what happened when we lost Niall Ronan to Munster when Jennings came in. (Or was it Jowitt?)

anonymous_joe

Amazotheamazing wrote: »

I dunno, O'Driscoll has probably captained Munster more times than Cullen captained Leicester, I wouldn't read much into it.

If Cullen had been fit for the full season, he might have played his way onto the Irish bench, but he's not a workhorse like DOC (who has freakish stats for a second row) so he would have to overtake POC to get gametime with Ireland. With respect to him, he's not on the same level as O'Connell, who's probably the finest second row in Europe at the minute.

If you want to drop DOC, you need to need to find someone who'll replace his workrate, none of the other second rows really offer this, imo.

Ah sure it's all pie in teh sky stuff, and it really is subjective.

Personally I rate DOC higher than O'Connell in terms of importance to the team. I think that freakish work ethic is crucial. Then again, O'Connell and Cullen aren't exactly slouches when it comes to workrate.

It's a position Ireland are quite healthy in, but for the fact that all those lads are around 30ish.

sm.org

anonymous_joe wrote: »

Ah sure it's all pie in teh sky stuff, and it really is subjective.

Personally I rate DOC higher than O'Connell in terms of importance to the team. I think that freakish work ethic is crucial. Then again, O'Connell and Cullen aren't exactly slouches when it comes to workrate.

It's a position Ireland are quite healthy in, but for the fact that all those lads are around 30ish.

True enough but there's a decent core of younger players in Toner/Ryan/Caldwell coming through. I think second rows are like props in that they tend to peak in their late twenties/early thirties.

anonymous_joe

sm.org wrote: »

True enough but there's a decent core of younger players in Toner/Ryan/Caldwell coming through. I think second rows are like props in that they tend to peak in their late twenties/early thirties.

Takes a long time to develop a physique that powerful with the athelticism to leap like a salmon on amphetamines. I should know, I wasn't able to do that.

laugh

anonymous_joe wrote: »

Yes and no. Hines will definitely be playing for the international breaks.

Like the six nations when he is playing for Scotland?

anonymous_joe

laugh wrote: »

Like the six nations when he is playing for Scotland?

I meant internationally. ^^

Badly written on my part.