Connacht Team Talk/Gossip/Rumours Thread.

seanin4711

connemara man wrote: »

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.

Same could have been said any of the last ten seasons, its par for the course.history repeating over and over.
Good to see some modicum of form materialise finally.
Beat Scarlets and onwards and upwards.
What's the story with all injured players in limbo?
Will the irfu give us dispensation to borrow a few benchwarmers from other provinces to tie us over?

ouncer

S12b wrote: »

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.

OK,I typed in big long answer on tablet which I've lost. so here is the shortened version
- when toh went in at fullback against zebre in the first game of the pro12 it was obvious there was someone better than Gavin
- fionn, our leading try scorer, has been our leading try giver
- griffin has turned over more ball than any centre this year
- Robbie has learnt to not kick ball but still is unaware of options around him
- Dan chucks ball out fast to elude tackle but does offer opportunities to wingers when he plays
- ronaldson has proved himself as a quality centre but a poor out half
- marmion is finally breaking lines by himself. he has already had a good season but now he is getting even better
- McKeon is simply quality
- Muldoon is a great servant but
- George was a favourite but very poor this season
- muldowney has been a huge disappointment. thought he would simply walk into swiftys place
- Craig Clarke, most important player Connacht have
- Buckley, fine talent, completely destroyed last weekend
- jhw fantastic

hermano

ouncer wrote: »

OK,I typed in big long answer on tablet which I've lost. so here is the shortened version
- when toh went in at fullback against zebre in the first game of the pro12 it was obvious there was someone better than Gavin
- fionn, our leading try scorer, has been our leading try giver
- griffin has turned over more ball than any centre this year
- Robbie has learnt to not kick ball but still is unaware of options around him
- Dan chucks ball out fast to elude tackle but does offer opportunities to wingers when he plays
- ronaldson has proved himself as a quality centre but a poor out half
- marmion is finally breaking lines by himself. he has already had a good season but now he is getting even better
- McKeon is simply quality
- Muldoon is a great servant but
- George was a favourite but very poor this season
- muldowney has been a huge disappointment. thought he would simply walk into swiftys place
- Craig Clarke, most important player Connacht have
- Buckley, fine talent, completely destroyed last weekend
- jhw fantastic

Funk It

ouncer wrote: »

- Buckley, fine talent, completely destroyed last weekend

Wait, so you mean that after 30mins of utter dominance that resulted in the entire Dragons front row being taken off, that Buckley was completely destroyed?
I thought that asides missing the bind a couple times that he still did well. In fact I can vividly remember Rodney twice getting some airtime in the scrum as he popped up under pressure.

evil_seed

ouncer wrote: »

- Muldoon is a great servant but

but what?

connemara man

seanin4711 wrote: »

Same could have been said any of the last ten seasons, its par for the course.history repeating over and over.
Good to see some modicum of form materialise finally.
Beat Scarlets and onwards and upwards.
What's the story with all injured players in limbo?
Will the irfu give us dispensation to borrow a few benchwarmers from other provinces to tie us over?

True but this year we've genuinely looked like contenders more often than not. any run to 6th before would of had the look of luck. This year we have a better squad than before and are trying something new. Like I said we threw away too many matches early on. I see us being a lot more consistent next season.

Re Buckley and the game plan last week. When you force the opposition to change like we did that's a player doing well, and if like it did you stagnate a bit the best thing is to keep doing the fundamentals go through your game plan and you will reap rewards. There's no point forcing the issue looking for scores. Look at Edinburgh away we were in contention on the score board up until 20-15 to go tried to force it and got embarrassed for it

S12b

ouncer wrote: »

OK,I typed in big long answer on tablet which I've lost. so here is the shortened version
- when toh went in at fullback against zebre in the first game of the pro12 it was obvious there was someone better than Gavin
- fionn, our leading try scorer, has been our leading try giver
- griffin has turned over more ball than any centre this year
- Robbie has learnt to not kick ball but still is unaware of options around him
- Dan chucks ball out fast to elude tackle but does offer opportunities to wingers when he plays
- ronaldson has proved himself as a quality centre but a poor out half
- marmion is finally breaking lines by himself. he has already had a good season but now he is getting even better
- McKeon is simply quality
- Muldoon is a great servant but
- George was a favourite but very poor this season
- muldowney has been a huge disappointment. thought he would simply walk into swiftys place
- Craig Clarke, most important player Connacht have
- Buckley, fine talent, completely destroyed last weekend
- jhw fantastic

Thanks for the response but you didn't answer the question. You originally said out of form players were being picked over in form players but all you have done above is list issues you have with first team players rather than backing up your statements by suggesting alternative players to replace all of these seemingly out of form players.

Are you saying the above players have been poor at various times and should have been replaced? And if so, by who?

its_phil

God I hope JHW is fit for this game. I think our slim hopes away from home are dependent on him with his darts to set up the maul.

I do hope if there is a tight kick for 3 points on offer against the Scarlets we turn it down and go for the corner. Our maul is that good I think we will end up with tries from 5m out close to every time.

porterbelly

Name Position Team
Tristan Moran LH Prop Bay of Plenty
Ross Kennedy Lock Hawkes Bay
Alex Ryan Lock Southland
Michael Fitzgerald Lock Manawatu
Adam Bradey Flanker Hawkes Bay
Brendon O'Connor Flanker Canterbury
Shane Christie Flanker Canterbury
Scott McKee Number 8 Southland
Kylem O'Donnell Scrum-half Taranaki
Matt Saunders Centre Southland
Michael Collins Centre Otago
Kieran Moffat Centre Otago
Sam Monaghan Wing Canterbury
Declan O'Donnell Wing Waikato

Took this from Ulsterfans

It's a list of players in Super Rugby who have some Irish backgrounds, a la Sean Maitland with Scotland or Michael Bent.

These would be the players the IRFU would like the provinces to take an interest in and scout

b.gud

Team unchanged again

Head Coach Pat Lam has once again named an unchanged Connacht side for the trip to Scarlets on Sunday, March 30th, kick off 2:05pm.

Hooker Jason Harris-Wright will earn his 40th cap for the province on Sunday afternoon, starting in a front row with Denis Buckley and last week’s try scorer Rodney Ah You.

Galway-man John Muldoon, who has touched down for four tries in the last two games, will captain the side from the back row.

23-year-old Eoin Griffin made an impressive 21 tackles against the Dragons last week and will again partner Dave McSharry in the centre as the team look to record their fifth successive win in the competition.

Commenting on the team selection and the upcoming game, Head Coach Pat Lam said:

“Being able to put out the same team for the third fixture in a row is testament to the performance of those players selected. The recent team performances have been driven by huge competition for places within the squad. Our training has certainly gone up another level in the last number of weeks and we have some experienced and quality players in key positions all pushing hard for a starting place. It makes selection tough in one way but it is also great to see the guys named striving to perform on behalf of the entire squad.

“It’s always been a challenge going over to play Scarlets and it’s been nearly ten years since we’ve won at Llanelli. The fact that both sides are now fighting for a top six finish definitely adds some spice. Scarlets have just come off the back of two losses and will see us as a winnable game at home, especially with the amount of internationals they have in their squad. Despite the number of injuries we have, there is a real confidence and belief in our game and the process we need to go through to achieve the different milestones we’ve set out for ourselves.“

Connacht line-up v Scarlets

15. Robbie Henshaw
14. Tiernan O’Halloran
13. Eoin Griffin
12. Dave McSharry
11. Fionn Carr
10. Dan Parks
9. Kieran Marmion

1. Denis Buckley
2. Jason Harris-Wright
3. Rodney Ah You
4. Aly Muldowney
5. Mick Kearney
6. John Muldoon (captain)
7. Eoghan Masterson
8. Eoin McKeon

Replacements:

16. Dave Heffernan
17. Ronan Loughney
18. Nathan White
19. Michael Swift
20. Andrew Browne
21. Frank Murphy
22. Miah Nikora
23. Darragh Leader

Unavailable/Injured: Brett Wilkinson, Sean Henry, James Rael, Craig Clarke, Jake Heenan, Willie Faloon, Aaron Conneely, Paul O’Donohoe, Craig Ronaldson, Matt Healy.

freyners

having JHW for this is huge

b.gud

freyners wrote: »

having JHW for this is huge

Ya it is, I only hope he hasn't been rushed back and is 100 % fit

CatFromHue

porterbelly wrote: »

Name Position Team
Tristan Moran LH Prop Bay of Plenty
Ross Kennedy Lock Hawkes Bay
Alex Ryan Lock Southland
Michael Fitzgerald Lock Manawatu
Adam Bradey Flanker Hawkes Bay
Brendon O'Connor Flanker Canterbury
Shane Christie Flanker Canterbury
Scott McKee Number 8 Southland
Kylem O'Donnell Scrum-half Taranaki
Matt Saunders Centre Southland
Michael Collins Centre Otago
Kieran Moffat Centre Otago
Sam Monaghan Wing Canterbury
Declan O'Donnell Wing Waikato

Took this from Ulsterfans

It's a list of players in Super Rugby who have some Irish backgrounds, a la Sean Maitland with Scotland or Michael Bent.

These would be the players the IRFU would like the provinces to take an interest in and scout

I thought Declan O'Donnel as he'd played 7's was tied to NZ now.

ouncer

Connacht vs scarlets on rte2hd with Shane Horgan and Donal lenihan offering analysis. Munster vs Leinster game only on tg4. we must be moving up the value chain:-)

freyners

All im seeing is RTE would rather go all the way to ways than down the M50 to the SG:P

Zzippy

freyners wrote: »

All im seeing is RTE would rather go all the way to ways than down the M50 to the SG:P

Yeah, cheaper to take the BBC Wales camera feed and send a microphone and 2 commentators to Wales than a whole OB unit to Galway...

ouncer

evil_seed wrote: »

but what?

rolling back the years swifty was always in the middle of things no matter how the game was going while joc and Muldoon blew hot and cold. my point is, and this is my personal opinion, is that Muldoon is great when the team is great but tends to be invisible when the team is struggling. and I think scarlets is going to be no easy game this weekend. Connacht will not do what they did to dragons last weekend.

ouncer

evil_seed wrote: »

but what?

sorry double post

Zzippy

ouncer wrote: »

rolling back the years swifty was always in the middle of things no matter how the game was going while joc and Muldoon blew hot and cold. my point is, and this is my personal opinion, is that Muldoon is great when the team is great but tends to be invisible when the team is struggling. and I think scarlets is going to be no easy game this weekend. Connacht will not do what they did to dragons last weekend.

Yeah, 4 tries in 2 games, he's playing sh1t alright...

ouncer

Zzippy wrote: »

Yeah, 4 tries in 2 games, he's playing sh1t alright...

this is not what I said

freyners

ouncer wrote: »

this is not what I said

but your still not making sense. If even what you say is true then your advocating get rid of a player who is quite clearly hot at the moment. It doesnt make sense

Your point on Buckley is also quite clearly at odds with what happened on the pitch

Zzippy

ouncer wrote: »

this is not what I said

You criticised Muldoon for something you perceive to be a problem with his game in the past, just after 2 games where he's scored 4 tries. Nonsense stuff. But as usual, you'll deny you criticised him, then wait til he does have a bad game so you can be "proved right". Same with Buckley, had a stormer last week and helped to demolish the opposition front row, but he was "completely destroyed last weekend".

Can I have some of those drugs you're taking? That's good sh1t...

ouncer

freyners wrote: »

but your still not making sense. If even what you say is true then your advocating get rid of a player who is quite clearly hot at the moment. It doesnt make sense

Your point on Buckley is also quite clearly at odds with what happened on the pitch

freyners, if you search through my posts I would be the first person to support Buckley as first choice. however I don't accept that what I said is at odds with what happened on the pitch. Duncan destroyed Buckley to the point that the scrum became ineffective. so stuff happens and we no longer had an advantage. as said I just want a team that can change with the times. instead we had 30 odd minutes of terrible rugby until bell got replaced. it follows my argument that Muldoon is great while things are great but if you reviewed the game Muldoon was, as I say, invisible when times got tough. McKeon was as usual consistently quality. the loss of Clarke is our biggest loss going forward.

finally I don't advocate getting rid of Muldoon. I suggest when games are in the balance he is not my favourite

Zzippy

ouncer wrote: »

freyners, if you search through my posts I would be the first person to support Buckley as first choice. however I don't accept that what I said is at odds with what happened on the pitch. Duncan destroyed Buckley to the point that the scrum became ineffective. so stuff happens and we no longer had an advantage. as said I just want a team that can change with the times. instead we had 30 odd minutes of terrible rugby until bell got replaced. it follows my argument that Muldoon is great while things are great but if you reviewed the game Muldoon was, as I say, invisible when times got tough. McKeon was as usual consistently quality. the loss of Clarke is our biggest loss going forward.

finally I don't advocate getting rid of Muldoon. I suggest when games are in the balance he is not my favourite

Absolute self-contradictory nonsense. If Buckley was "destroyed", our scrum would have been collapsing, going backwards at a rate of knots, or Buckley would have been yellow carded. None of that happened. After half an hour of utter dominance, Buckley came up against a bigger prop with a jersey painted onto him, couldn't get a grip and lost his bind a couple of times. Instead of being totally dominant, there was parity in the scrum, as is usual in a lot of games. Equating parity in the scrum with a prop being "destroyed" is ridiculous nonsense.

freyners

ouncer wrote: »

freyners, if you search through my posts I would be the first person to support Buckley as first choice. however I don't accept that what I said is at odds with what happened on the pitch. Duncan destroyed Buckley to the point that the scrum became ineffective. so stuff happens and we no longer had an advantage. as said I just want a team that can change with the times. instead we had 30 odd minutes of terrible rugby until bell got replaced. it follows my argument that Muldoon is great while things are great but if you reviewed the game Muldoon was, as I say, invisible when times got tough. McKeon was as usual consistently quality. the loss of Clarke is our biggest loss going forward.

finally I don't advocate getting rid of Muldoon. I suggest when games are in the balance he is not my favourite

Sorry getting parity does not mean he got destroyed, it means parity:rolleyes:

ouncer

freyners wrote: »

Sorry getting parity does not mean he got destroyed, it means parity:rolleyes:

strangely if you view my previous posts on the matter I indicated the exact word parity. Buckley was taken out of the equation, could not bind, hence scrum was brought to 'parity'. I have made my views clear on this matter. he was unable to compete so an alternative strategy was required. instead it was 30 minutes of terrible rugby against a team that was awful.

I don't see anything from your posts that change my viewpoint. I would be interested with my 'impression' that Muldoon disappears when the going gets tough?

I also beg the question is the same team selection the answer for every game. if you take the scarlets game I simply ask the question how would you play this game. should we be outright aggressive, should we try and hold our lines. they have many internationals back in their squad. how do you react to that? we have won the weakest of games, is our current selection ready to win a big game. who are the weaknesses? what is the proper game strategy? just floating the questions, Muldoon being one of them

freyners

ouncer wrote: »

strangely if you view my previous posts on the matter I indicated the exact word parity. Buckley was taken out of the equation, could not bind, hence scrum was brought to 'parity'. I have made my views clear on this matter. he was unable to compete so an alternative strategy was required. instead it was 30 minutes of terrible rugby against a team that was awful.

I don't see anything from your posts that change my viewpoint. I would be interested with my 'impression' that Muldoon disappears when the going gets tough?

I also beg the question is the same team selection the answer for every game. if you take the scarlets game I simply ask the question how would you play this game. should we be outright aggressive, should we try and hold our lines. they have many internationals back in their squad. how do you react to that? we have won the weakest of games, is our current selection ready to win a big game. who are the weaknesses? what is the proper game strategy? just floating the questions, Muldoon being one of them

No you said he got completely destroyed, right here

Buckley, fine talent, completely destroyed last weekend

destroyed does not equal parity. Stop pretending otherwise

Your muldoon point would hold some water if you could point to examples. In our bad games he has still been one of our better tacklers, not the swifty like hits, but the chokes and the gainline hits he does superbly

Scarlets game, who would you swap? No point beggin a question if your not going to suggest an alernative

S12b

ouncer wrote: »

strangely if you view my previous posts on the matter I indicated the exact word parity. Buckley was taken out of the equation, could not bind, hence scrum was brought to 'parity'. I have made my views clear on this matter. he was unable to compete so an alternative strategy was required. instead it was 30 minutes of terrible rugby against a team that was awful.

I don't see anything from your posts that change my viewpoint. I would be interested with my 'impression' that Muldoon disappears when the going gets tough?

I also beg the question is the same team selection the answer for every game. if you take the scarlets game I simply ask the question how would you play this game. should we be outright aggressive, should we try and hold our lines. they have many internationals back in their squad. how do you react to that? we have won the weakest of games, is our current selection ready to win a big game. who are the weaknesses? what is the proper game strategy? just floating the questions, Muldoon being one of them

So name a player!! You make general statements against players calling for change but you never actually name VIABLE alternatives (i.e Mata Fafita at 12 instead of Griffin).
If Buckley was getting destroyed (he wasn't), what would you have done?

Shelflife

Lads, lads ,lads will ye stop being drawn in by the the George hook of boards !

Make comment about popular player, refuse to be specific, deny you said the comment, cry about being misunderstood , leave for a day or so.

Repeat ad nauseaum !

irishbucsfan

Huge match today for Connacht. I wonder, is it on any channel in the UK? I may try BBC Wales. This game could define Connacht's season.