Alan Gaffney

chupacabra

I don't care what the pundits have said about Irelands attack in this world cup. I have found it predictable, boring, too lateral, totally lacking imagination and at times embarrassing. Dont kid yourselves, Russia are one of if not the worst team in the competition, we put 2 tries in the last quarter against a tiring and weak italian team, our performance against Australia was TOTALLY lacking of attacking ability and it was the same against the USA. Gaffney is living in the past with his attacking system. Its all set piece and very little penetration in open play. He HAS to go now, I have said it in the past and I will continue to say it. We have some of the best backs in europe at our disposal and all they can do is go left to right to left to right and then execute half decent plays off of set pieces. He has to go.

s8n

Knee-jerk reaction tbh....go make yourself a nice cuppa

s8n

s8n wrote: »

Knee-jerk reaction tbh....go make yourself a nice cuppa

guarantee he posted something similar 5 months back, as did many of us.

I'm not going to get drawn into this debate yet, as people will just attribute any and all negativity as the above.

Risteard

He is leaving. Only coach who's contract was not renewed beforehand.

Our backplay has been poor IMO, especially when you see what most of the same players do under Schmidt, but that game was lost up front today.

tolosenc

He is gone, isn't he?

Kiwi_knock

Throughout the tournament our backplay has been poor but our forwards work has covered it. Today we were given our first real test of our pack and when they struggled there was no real spark in the backline to create the gaps. Our play was far too reliant on the forwards, when the ball out the line most of the players looked fairly clueless with what to do with it.

donfers

i've said it for a long time too, the game has left this guy behind, it's easy to pinpoint him now but the truth is our back play has been pedestrian for a couple of years

indeed most of our tries in recent times have come from spontaneous unplanned back moves or kicks in behind - our backs coach unfortunately hasn't offered a lot

tughfc

Risteard wrote: »

He is leaving. Only coach who's contract was not renewed beforehand.

Our backplay has been poor IMO, especially when you see what most of the same players do under Schmidt, but that game was lost up front today.

He's choosing to leave!

Risteard

tughfc wrote: »

He's choosing to leave!

I know. It's not like they kicked him out. Heading back to Australia to take up a position at the Waratahs I believe.

profitius

Leinster scored the least amount of tries in the ML the last season he was there. Schmidt came in and look at the difference. I think that says alot about Gaffney.

.ak

So, anybody in the know aware of the eligible list of replacements for the position?

BBDBB

.ak wrote: »

So, anybody in the know aware of the eligible list of replacements for the position?

I reckon Martin Johnson may be available soon


seriously, its been known about his departure for some time, so a replacement has already or will be lined up in the near future after a suitable time, ie once he is gone Im sure

Tigerandahalf

It's easy to blame the backs coach but do we really have the quality in the backs. I'd agree that there has been a real lack of rehearsed moves off lineout and scrum, with the exception of the great try against Italy. But you need players who can catch an opposition kick and tear down the field leaving 2 or 3 players in their wake. At present we don't have backs of that calibre.

ambid

BBDBB wrote: »

I reckon Martin Johnson may be available soon


seriously, its been known about his departure for some time, so a replacement has already or will be lined up in the near future after a suitable time, ie once he is gone Im sure

I'm hoping for Peter de Villiers or Marc Lievrem...

No actually I can't even bring myself to joke about it.

I imagine Kideny will surprise us with an unexpected name, probably from the SH. If they could only clone Joe Schmidt

Tigerandahalf

Tigerandahalf wrote: »

It's easy to blame the backs coach but do we really have the quality in the backs. I'd agree that there has been a real lack of rehearsed moves off lineout and scrum, with the exception of the great try against Italy. But you need players who can catch an opposition kick and tear down the field leaving 2 or 3 players in their wake. At present we don't have backs of that calibre.

without opening this into a provincial dribble fest.

Watch Leinster play with this backline

9 Reddan (available for Ireland)
10 Sexton (available for Ireland)
11 Fitzgerald (available for Ireland, but Earls/Trimble should be more than able to do everything Fitz can on the wing)
12 D'Arcy (available for Ireland)
13 BOD (available for Ireland)
14 Nacewa (Bowe a world class winger who has never had a problem doing the good things well)
15 Kearney (available for Ireland)

Watch Leinster's back play, compare it to Ireland's. It's worlds apart. What's the logical difference between the two teams? The coach, the gameplan, the messages, the setup.

The Leinster players above play a completely different game in Green, one that has seemed fairly pedestrian and pathetic at trying to actually be incisive tbh.

Gaffney has to take the brunt of the blunting blame.

steve9859

BBDBB wrote: »

I reckon Martin Johnson may be available soon

Just hope that its not Brian Smith, the one time Irish outhalf, instead - he was linked with Ireland as EoS' replacement before he became England's attacking coach. Alan Gaffney is an attacking genius compared to him. The English midfield couldn't even pass in front of the man!

Tigerandahalf

That backline struggled against a big physical team in the HCup final in Northhampton. I think Nacewa is also a huge difference. He is the one type of player we don't have who can field the ball and attack the space with speed and verve. We need players like that to be brought through, if they are there. Conway looked very promising with the u20s in the WC and looks like genuine quality but whether he will be able to play the full back role at the top level is another question.

.ak

I just hope it's someone that specializes in back play and not someone with the merits of international coaching.

cython

Deleted User wrote: »

without opening this into a provincial dribble fest.

Watch Leinster play with this backline

9 Reddan (available for Ireland)
10 Sexton (available for Ireland)
11 Fitzgerald (available for Ireland, but Earls/Trimble should be more than able to do everything Fitz can on the wing)
12 D'Arcy (available for Ireland)
13 BOD (available for Ireland)
14 Nacewa (Bowe a world class winger who has never had a problem doing the good things well)
15 Kearney (available for Ireland)

Watch Leinster's back play, compare it to Ireland's. It's worlds apart. What's the logical difference between the two teams? The coach, the gameplan, the messages, the setup.

The Leinster players above play a completely different game in Green, one that has seemed fairly pedestrian and pathetic at trying to actually be incisive tbh.

Gaffney has to take the brunt of the blunting blame.

Just to back that up, I've also seen better offloading and fluid play from Munster at times of late than I've seen from Ireland most of the time barring the 6N blip against England (as well as we played against Australia, it wasn't a flowing backline driven game).

For players from those two teams to lose this flair whenever they come into the national side, there must be a problem in the coaching, and the backs are squarely Gaffney's responsibility. If Ferris and SOB consistently lost the chance (I hesitate to say ability, as I believe they have a natural affinity rather than being strictly coached) to make crashing runs (thereby taking away one of their strongest weapons) when they came into the Irish camp, we'd likely be levelling criticism at Gert Smal, or maybe DK for the overall plan, so Gaffney is the equivalent authority here.

ETA: Actually, we have done this at DK in the case of SOB playing 7 and having his chances for runs limited!

BarackPyjama

Alan Gaffney is easily the worst backs coach of the professional rugby era. A man who can take a talented back line and have them running around like headless chickens. Worse than utterly incompetent. Good riddance.