Connacht Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread.

its_phil

Times said this morning that Browne, Masterson and McSharry were the main worries. That's a good sign for the hooker crisis, but the flanker crisis worsens

porterbelly

Best option if stuck at hooker would be to get Ger Slattery for a couple of months. He has no contract with Munster and is not needed now anymore.

CIARAN_BOYLE

porterbelly wrote: »

Best option if stuck at hooker would be to get Ger Slattery for a couple of months. He has no contract with Munster and is not needed now anymore.

I'm pretty sure that once you've played a game in the league you can't play for another team that season.

S12b

its_phil wrote: »

Times said this morning that Browne, Masterson and McSharry were the main worries. That's a good sign for the hooker crisis, but the flanker crisis worsens

Gilsenan played for UCD at the weekend so if Masterson is out, I guess he could slot in at 7.

freyners

CIARAN_BOYLE wrote: »

I'm pretty sure that once you've played a game in the league you can't play for another team that season.

Pretty sure you can, otherwise the Borlase loan last year was worthless

CatFromHue

Did Borlase actually play a game in his second season for Munster?

On their website they have him down as only playing in his first season, the 10/11 one, nothing after.

Lol even when you go to the squad profiles for 11/12 he's not listed!

Edit: Just looking at the Rabo site and they state:
5.5. No player is eligible to play for a Team in the RaboDirect PRO12 if he transfers or is registered after the 20th March 2012 during the relevant season (although there is an exception for under 18 players in certain circumstances).
http://www.rabodirectpro12.com/statzone/competition_rules.php

I'm guessing that means you you can't add to your squad after 20th March.

freyners

CatFromHue wrote: »

Did Borlase actually play a game in his second season for Munster?

On their website they have him down as only playing in his first season, the 10/11 one, nothing after.

Lol even when you go to the squad profiles for 11/12 he's not listed!

Never considered that actually, always presumed he did. In that case CB is probably right

Harsh on fringe player like Slattery in that case, presuming he would be interested.

Buer

It's allowed. Lee Jones has played for Edinburgh for a few years and is on loan at Glasgow since last month. He has appeared for both sides this season.

porterbelly

Geoff Cross is on loan with Glasgow from Embra also

Lam said that Buckley and Jack Dineen will back up Heff

Stanza2

Geoff Cross has signed for London Irish for next season.

Funk It

Not good news at all, Indo report that Brett Wilkinson is forced to retire after neck ligament damage sustained during Saracens game.

A big fan of Brett, a hard worker who always did his bit in a Connacht shirt.

eyeball kid

Funk It wrote: »

Not good news at all, Indo report that Brett Wilkinson is forced to retire after neck ligament damage sustained during Saracens game.

A big fan of Brett, a hard worker who always did his bit in a Connacht shirt.

Yeah, a huge shock alright. Hope he's alright and doesn't need surgery. He'll be a big loss to the team.

http://www.connachtrugby.ie/wilkinson-to-retire-with-injury/#ConnachtNews

hermano

Funk It wrote: »

Not good news at all, Indo report that Brett Wilkinson is forced to retire after neck ligament damage sustained during Saracens game.

A big fan of Brett, a hard worker who always did his bit in a Connacht shirt.

Big blow but at least it will mean Buckley will be first choice. This should speed along his development.

b.gud

Two retirements in the space of a week. It can be easy to forget sometimes just how much of a toll the sport can take on player. All the best to Brett, he was a great player for Connacht and will be missed

freyners

wow, poor brett. Sickener for him

Feel bad he never got an ireland cap. Certainly deserved it more than once. His health is the priority tho. Also he is lucky that he had time to pick up his degrees/certs already

Best of luck in your future career brett, you were and always will be a legend for us

errlloyd

I haven't watched many of his games, but based on posters here and commentators all over Bret was a top class professional, I wish him all the best for the future.

connemara man

Its a shame to hear about Wilkinson hes a true club man. Hopefully his future outside the game goes well

phog

eyeball kid wrote: »

Yeah, a huge shock alright. Hope he's alright and doesn't need surgery. He'll be a big loss to the team.

http://www.connachtrugby.ie/wilkinson-to-retire-with-injury/#ConnachtNews

Terrible to see players having to retire early due to injury. Best of Luck to him in the future.

RobbieRuns

Gutted for the big man. Best of luck to him.

Careers can end very quickly in this game.

wp_rathead

Very tough news to take - been ever presemt in squad over the years. A gentleman of the pitch aswell

hermano wrote: »

Big blow but at least it will mean Buckley will be first choice. This should speed along his development.

Really dude? I know you don't mean anything by it but seems rather heartless talking of any positives from this

hermano

wprathead wrote: »

Very tough news to take - been ever presemt in squad over the years. A gentleman of the pitch aswell

Really dude? I know you don't mean anything by it but seems rather heartless talking of any positives from this

Apologies if it sounded heartless but there are some positives. He has managed to escape with his health (touch wood). It could've been alot worse. Plus hes had a decade as a professional player. I'm sure Tonetti and Eoin O'Malley would've loved to play another 5, 6 years.

Diabhal Beag

Was shocked when I heard the news. Wish the guy all the best because he's an absolute gent of the highest order.

its_phil

Cracking player and was at the early stages of the season the form loose-head in the country. I would have ranked him up there as our player of the season until Rodney, Marmion and Heenan took it to another level. Very very sad to see him go and hopefully his insurance payout will look after him well

ouncer

Brett, nice guy and gave it all every time he has played. a sad end to a great career. my only hope is that his recovery allows him to achieve all his goals in life outside rugby. he will be sorely missed

Fireball07

A good prop for many years, that's very bad news for him. Will be a loss to Connacht, and must be gutting for him too.


Good luck to him in his retirement, his health is a priority.

connemara man

The run in.
After 4 wins on the trot now we have put ourselves in the contention for 6th. If we beat Scarlets will the run in be our downfall or will Scarlets and Edinburgh do us a huge favour?

I think we have left ourselves too much work to do. But stranger things have happened. It took the team too long to get into the swing of things at the start of the year and we dropped points when the win went a begging.

ouncer

connemara man wrote: »

The run in.
After 4 wins on the trot now we have put ourselves in the contention for 6th. If we beat Scarlets will the run in be our downfall or will Scarlets and Edinburgh do us a huge favour?

I think we have left ourselves too much work to do. But stranger things have happened. It took the team too long to get into the swing of things at the start of the year and we dropped points when the win went a begging.

its a bit unfortunate that the new rugby layout wasn't known at the start of the season. as far as Connacht knew they had to be one of the top 3 Irish provinces and that's a bit of ask at the best of times.

Connacht have been guilty of dropping points too easily over many seasons so can't blame lam for that :-) . that said it has taken him far too long to identify form players versus non-form players. the insistence on sticking with experience for a large part of the season when results showed that this was fallacy I feel is the reason why Connacht will struggle to get inside the top 6. that said it would seem the lesson has been learnt so we can do is our best until the end of the season. I can't see the same mistake being made next year with Connacht being fully aware of the ramifications

connemara man

I think we lost the tight ones between a mixture of sticking with the old and struggling with the game plan. The younger players one could say adapted better and should of been playing more.
But id say 7th this year and I see no reason to see we wouldn't qualify for Europe ourselves if we push on in the way we have been recently

ouncer

connemara man wrote: »

I think we lost the tight ones between a mixture of sticking with the old and struggling with the game plan. The younger players one could say adapted better and should of been playing more.
But id say 7th this year and I see no reason to see we wouldn't qualify for Europe ourselves if we push on in the way we have been recently

I would argue (because this is what I do:-) ) that, as I have pointed out after last weekend, we still struggle with a FLUID game plan. in-game we have set a seemingly working pattern and then show no ability to change it when it starts to malfunction. and this also reflects the season as a whole. it took time for pat to address game by game the weaknesses shown. his next leap of faith is to identify what is not working within an 80 minute game. a huge leap but he may surprise us further:-)

S12b

ouncer wrote: »

its a bit unfortunate that the new rugby layout wasn't known at the start of the season. as far as Connacht knew they had to be one of the top 3 Irish provinces and that's a bit of ask at the best of times.

Connacht have been guilty of dropping points too easily over many seasons so can't blame lam for that :-) . that said it has taken him far too long to identify form players versus non-form players. the insistence on sticking with experience for a large part of the season when results showed that this was fallacy I feel is the reason why Connacht will struggle to get inside the top 6. that said it would seem the lesson has been learnt so we can do is our best until the end of the season. I can't see the same mistake being made next year with Connacht being fully aware of the ramifications

You talk about identifying form players versus non-form players and sticking with experience but can you actually expressly set out what you mean.

Our current pack, barring a few injuries is basically the same group of 12 or so guys we have been working from all season. The only forwards I believe you could fairly say were out of form at some stage during this season are Muldowney and George. George was only being picked when McKeon was injured. Muldowney is now getting his game and is starting to go well.

In the backs, the two golden oldies (Duffy and Parks) were terrible at the start of the season. I was looking for both of them to be dropped for a good while. With the return to form of TOH and Leader's breakthrough, Duffy's days seem to have passed. In fairness to Dan, he has turned it around since he was dropped around Christmas time and has been very good for the last few games.

So as I say, I'm genuinely interested to see you expand on what you said because from what I can see, no out of form players (Duffy and Parks aside) were being selected throughout the season.