Summer rugby?

Swiwi

Tox56 wrote: »

As a former back I'll always favour scintillating backline moves over anything else, and I'd love to see Ireland play this way, but I don't think that means Ireland can't produce a pack up there with the best. Munster dominated Europe behind their (predominantly Irish) pack just 5-6 years ago. Leinster over the last few years should be the protoype. They won games in France (and elsewhere in Europe) on the back of a big pack performance (albeit with a little help on one occasion from BBBT), and although the Schmidt-inspired back play will be how that team will be remembered, it was a very good group of forwards. Look at the team that started that game v Clermont:

R Kearney, Nacewa, O'Driscoll, D'Arcy, Fitzgerald, J Sexton, Boss, Healy, Strauss, Ross, Cullen, Thorn, O'Brien, Jennings, Heaslip.

OK the backline is better, but people forget that was one of the best packs in Europe at the time. Leinster in those few years found a perfect balance, and there's no reason why Ireland can't.

Yeah I agree, but I dont mean choosing 8 behemoths like SA and Eng tend to produce. I can never remember NZ trying to outmuscle SA, it just doesn't work, so we rely on other skills. In saying that, John Hart went thru a phase of choosing light mobile loosies, best typified by Taine Randell, and that backfired spectacularly in '99, and there was hints of that v Eng last year, so you do need some bulk in the forwards, but in NZ at least, you have to be able to catch, pass & run, you just wont get selected if you can scrum and no more.

jimbomalley

Jesus if deccie gets re hired I am giving up on the nayional team....its bloody mental that there's stilll a fear of that happening. Loving watching the super 15 highlights at the moment. The pace of the game down south is so much quicker and a lot of it stems from quick ruck ball - something that only england are providing for their backs with their two nippy scrum halves. The weather definitely doesnt help though with what is done next and is making for poor viewing. Agree with all you said swiwi, the game looks so simple when it is played well and players are awareof whats happening around them...on the positive side though our provinces are at least attempting to emulate your game, maybe some day the national team can do the same

Swiwi

jimbomalley wrote: »

Jesus if deccie gets re hired I am giving up on the nayional team....its bloody mental that there's stilll a fear of that happening. Loving watching the super 15 highlights at the moment. The pace of the game down south is so much quicker and a lot of it stems from quick ruck ball - something that only england are providing for their backs with their two nippy scrum halves. The weather definitely doesnt help though with what is done next and is making for poor viewing. Agree with all you said swiwi, the game looks so simple when it is played well and players are awareof whats happening around them...on the positive side though our provinces are at least attempting to emulate your game, maybe some day the national team can do the same

I can't get over this "his future all depends on X game", as if a 1-point victory keeps him the job, and 1-point loss sees him on his bike. The 6N has been disappointing, I think the selections are generally OK, and there is no doubt the players are trying hard, but it hasn't really clicked, bar the first 40 v Wales. I cant really see much progress since the GS, and I think fresh ideas are needed.

.ak

Swiwi wrote: »

I can't get over this "his future all depends on X game", as if a 1-point victory keeps him the job, and 1-point loss sees him on his bike. The 6N has been disappointing, I think the selections are generally OK, and there is no doubt the players are trying hard, but it hasn't really clicked, bar the first 40 v Wales. I cant really see much progress since the GS, and I think fresh ideas are needed.

You're completely right and most of the posters here would agree with you, however the 'his future depends on X game' is more a testament that the IRFU/media are willing to forgive and forget if he gets an odd result. Sure, how else would he still be in the job other than all these false dawns and one off games?

Beery Eyed

Just to try and bring this back to the topic at hand though. Do you agree that playing the game in better conditions from an early age benefits the skill levels & fitness of players?

It’s all well and good to look at the senior setup and say that we should play a better brand of flowing rugby, but if we want that to happen then we have to put the structures in place which reward that game. Currently the conditions for a large portion of the season in Ireland don’t do this. Throughout all age levels there is an emphasis on “keep it simple” rugby. In other words short, crash balls, no attempted offloads, no long passes, kick for territory & take points where available. I’m not being overly negative, but this is the reality when conditions are poor, and for good reason. Attempting a free-flowing, expansive game in a downpour on a muddy pitch would be suicidal.

On the flip side, when you get down to games at the beginning or the end of the season, when the sun is out & the pitches are decent, it’s a completely different game. The only pity for me is that we actually pack up the season just as it’s starting to come into perfect conditions for open, expansive rugby.

Swiwi

Beery Eyed wrote: »

Just to try and bring this back to the topic at hand though. Do you agree that playing the game in better conditions from an early age benefits the skill levels & fitness of players?

It’s all well and good to look at the senior setup and say that we should play a better brand of flowing rugby, but if we want that to happen then we have to put the structures in place which reward that game. Currently the conditions for a large portion of the season in Ireland don’t do this. Throughout all age levels there is an emphasis on “keep it simple” rugby. In other words short, crash balls, no attempted offloads, no long passes, kick for territory & take points where available. I’m not being overly negative, but this is the reality when conditions are poor, and for good reason. Attempting a free-flowing, expansive game in a downpour on a muddy pitch would be suicidal.

On the flip side, when you get down to games at the beginning or the end of the season, when the sun is out & the pitches are decent, it’s a completely different game. The only pity for me is that we actually pack up the season just as it’s starting to come into perfect conditions for open, expansive rugby.

I agree that all the touch rugby (tag rugby) on the beach in a NZ summer, rounded off with a BBQ and a few beers might add to the passing skills...

...as people say though changing the rugby season in Ireland would clash with GAA etc.

Snickers Man

Thought I would bump this one back up because it is likely to be a topic that will be raised again soon.

The generally good standard of open rugby seen at the world cup just passed was due, at least in part, to the unusually mild weather that prevailed for most of the tournament. In a typical winter climate of driving wind and rain, oozing mud and freezing fingers it is more likely to find a game dominated by kicking and driving than by scintillating handling.

So, the idealists will think, why not shift the season so that rugby is played closer to the summer months so that we can avail of such beneficial conditions?

There are more hard-headed reasons too which have caused the money men in the game, ie the owners of French and English clubs, to consider a shift in the season. They want to align the rugby calendars of the northern and southern hemispheres more closely to increase the frequency of competition between the big teams, north and south, level the playing field and generate greater interest from emerging markets, especially in the US and the wealthier parts of Asia.

So what do we think?

Reasons pro change: as stated above, greater co-ordination between the seasons of rugby playing nations, better conditions producing a better game, more comfortable viewing conditions for people attending games.

Reasons against: IT'S A ****ING STUPID IDEA!!!!!!

To take our own parochial interests into account, it would mean that all our major ball sports (Gaelic football, Hurling, soccer and rugby) not to mention other summer pursuits such as horse racing, cricket, sailing, golf, athletics etc etc would all be telescoped into an increasingly tight window.

Of course the problems of a small nation of four million people don't amount to a hill of beans in the crazy world of the bean counters so let's speak in more general terms.

Sports like rugby were invented to give us something to do in our miserable winters. What the hell are we, and by we I mean Europeans, supposed to do if it gets moved? Hibernate?

More importantly, from a financial point of view, do the moneybags sponsors really want rugby moved away from winter? Do they want their entire marketing "window" telescoped into a few months in the middle of the year with no exposure at either end?

Of course they don't. Move rugby from winter to summer and you create a vacuum in the marketing market (sic) which will be filled by some other attraction. What that could be, I really don't know but rest assured something will be found to fill the gap. That something may or may not be another ball sport. It could be anything. How many times have you heard it said that the biggest competition to many sports nowadays is XBox or Playstation?

Rugby during the summer would only intensify competition between all existing ball sports (and others) for a limited budget that would inevitably cause some sports to fall by the wayside. And I'm not just talking in a parochial Irish context here. Sports like cricket, tennis and even golf would be squeezed by the need to attract bums on to seats where they were quite happy to sit when there wasn't a rugby match played elsewhere. And of course rugby would suffer similarly by those whose love of the game is additional to but not on a par with their enthusiasm for a more traditional summer pursuit.

On a personal level I just hate the notion that our miserable winters could be shorn of one of the few things that makes them bearable. So, personally, I think that anybody seriously suggesting a summer move should be dressed in an orange jump suit and handed over to ISIS, or be beaten to death with hammers.

Harsh? Maybe, but then as the great General Patton used to say to his soldiers after haranguing them at length about what was expected from them: "Okay you sons of bitches. Now you know how I feel!"

Not an inch!!! Or a minute!!

errlloyd

I wonder how much money it'd save rugby clubs in floodlight usage alone.

I'm a big fan of summer rugby as a concept. Eddie O Sullivan had a piece recently about realigning NH leagues so they no longer run concurrently and instead one after the other. I think this would be a good chance to do that. 6 nations, with the early rounds of the domestic league run at the same time (like the wc this year it gives the young guys a shot at the start of the season), domestic league all wrapped up within say 24 weeks of the 6n ending. Then a 10 week format for the eercc, then the autumn internationals and winter.

aimee1

CIARAN_BOYLE wrote: »

I don't really follow RL but didn't they only change to summer rugby a few years back? Did that have a major effect on their attendances and revenues?

super league in england changed to summer season 20 years ago and the grand final crowds have grown from 60000 [2001] to about 75000 [2015]

Any games Ive seen on BBC are fairly well attended. They also do the magic weekend with all 12 teams involved over one weekend and they have taken it to edinburgh, manchester, newcastle, cardiff in an attempt to increase interest and they get crowds of about 30-35k

Losty Dublin

aimee1 wrote: »

super league in england changed to summer season 20 years ago and the grand final crowds have grown from 60000 [2001] to about 75000 [2015]

Any games Ive seen on BBC are fairly well attended. They also do the magic weekend with all 12 teams involved over one weekend and they have taken it to edinburgh, manchester, newcastle, cardiff in an attempt to increase interest and they get crowds of about 30-35k

Superleague Rugby had investment and TV exposure from Sky Sports to help it along as well.

its_phil

I'd love to move it to the summer months but the GAA and the lack of domestic competition from other sports allows rugby more column lines than it probably should have mean I think we'd be a small fish in a big pond.

CatFromHue

If we moved to a Summer based season we'd get warmer weather but I'm not so sure if we'd get that much more of a drier season.

Just looking at the climate data for Dublin on Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin#Climate

Sep to May (incl) = average monthly rainfall in mm is 59.93 or total 539.4
Feb to Oct (incl) = average monthly rainfall in mm is 57.08 or total 513.7

With the lowest rainfall being in Feb, April, July, and March.

The average number of rainy days don't really change throughout the year either.

pickarooney

I think the good weather=good rugby idea is way overstated.
Toulon play a fairly turgid brand of power rugby and do so in a climate with minimal rainfall. Conditions are ideal for expansive, passing rugby for the majority of the season but this has no impact on how they play the game. It's not specific to Toulon but common throughout the south of France. Arguably the teams who play the most free flowing rugby are those on the Atlantic coast where wind and rain are much more common.
Although anyone watching UBB this year would see even they seem to have abandoned the beautiful game.

bilston

I'm just thinking aloud here so go easy on me...

Has continuous seasons ever been considered? By that I mean a 12 month long season with maybe a month off here and there? What would be better on the players bodies? 10 weeks off once each year or 3 breaks of 3 or 4 weeks at a time?

The Lost Sheep

Snickers Man wrote: »

Thought I would bump this one back up because it is likely to be a topic that will be raised again soon.

The generally good standard of open rugby seen at the world cup just passed was due, at least in part, to the unusually mild weather that prevailed for most of the tournament. In a typical winter climate of driving wind and rain, oozing mud and freezing fingers it is more likely to find a game dominated by kicking and driving than by scintillating handling.

So, the idealists will think, why not shift the season so that rugby is played closer to the summer months so that we can avail of such beneficial conditions?

There are more hard-headed reasons too which have caused the money men in the game, ie the owners of French and English clubs, to consider a shift in the season. They want to align the rugby calendars of the northern and southern hemispheres more closely to increase the frequency of competition between the big teams, north and south, level the playing field and generate greater interest from emerging markets, especially in the US and the wealthier parts of Asia.

So what do we think?

Reasons pro change: as stated above, greater co-ordination between the seasons of rugby playing nations, better conditions producing a better game, more comfortable viewing conditions for people attending games.

Reasons against: IT'S A ****ING STUPID IDEA!!!!!!

To take our own parochial interests into account, it would mean that all our major ball sports (Gaelic football, Hurling, soccer and rugby) not to mention other summer pursuits such as horse racing, cricket, sailing, golf, athletics etc etc would all be telescoped into an increasingly tight window.

Of course the problems of a small nation of four million people don't amount to a hill of beans in the crazy world of the bean counters so let's speak in more general terms.

Sports like rugby were invented to give us something to do in our miserable winters. What the hell are we, and by we I mean Europeans, supposed to do if it gets moved? Hibernate?

More importantly, from a financial point of view, do the moneybags sponsors really want rugby moved away from winter? Do they want their entire marketing "window" telescoped into a few months in the middle of the year with no exposure at either end?

Of course they don't. Move rugby from winter to summer and you create a vacuum in the marketing market (sic) which will be filled by some other attraction. What that could be, I really don't know but rest assured something will be found to fill the gap. That something may or may not be another ball sport. It could be anything. How many times have you heard it said that the biggest competition to many sports nowadays is XBox or Playstation?

Rugby during the summer would only intensify competition between all existing ball sports (and others) for a limited budget that would inevitably cause some sports to fall by the wayside. And I'm not just talking in a parochial Irish context here. Sports like cricket, tennis and even golf would be squeezed by the need to attract bums on to seats where they were quite happy to sit when there wasn't a rugby match played elsewhere. And of course rugby would suffer similarly by those whose love of the game is additional to but not on a par with their enthusiasm for a more traditional summer pursuit.

On a personal level I just hate the notion that our miserable winters could be shorn of one of the few things that makes them bearable. So, personally, I think that anybody seriously suggesting a summer move should be dressed in an orange jump suit and handed over to ISIS, or be beaten to death with hammers.

Harsh? Maybe, but then as the great General Patton used to say to his soldiers after haranguing them at length about what was expected from them: "Okay you sons of bitches. Now you know how I feel!"

Not an inch!!! Or a minute!!

I don't think it should be moved as we would lose out on players in a lot of the country due to the GAA. We have enough issues with competing with GAA in April/May/September/October so why make things harder for ourselves by competing with the GAA during its core part of the season?
Weather would be better but we would lose out on players and gaining new players.

CIARAN_BOYLE

bilston wrote: »

I'm just thinking aloud here so go easy on me...

Has continuous seasons ever been considered? By that I mean a 12 month long season with maybe a month off here and there? What would be better on the players bodies? 10 weeks off once each year or 3 breaks of 3 or 4 weeks at a time?

Coniditioning would suffer, not being able to do preseasons would be a major problem.

tigerboon

The Lost Sheep wrote: »

I don't think it should be moved as we would lose out on players in a lot of the country due to the GAA. We have enough issues with competing with GAA in April/May/September/October so why make things harder for ourselves by competing with the GAA during its core part of the season?
Weather would be better but we would lose out on players and gaining new players.

Outside Dublin you might only have 3-4 rugby clubs in a county. They may have players from up to 7 or 8 towns playing for them. At underage most lads will play GAA as well. They more than likely go to school and know their GAA team mates well whereas they may play rugby with a couple of their friends/schoolmates. if you force a 10-12 year old to chose between the two there is only going to be one outcome. As things stand, there is very little overlap in the playing seasons of each. Another thing is summer holiday season where underage GAA teams are decimated for about a month

The Lost Sheep

tigerboon wrote: »

Outside Dublin you might only have 3-4 rugby clubs in a county. They may have players from up to 7 or 8 towns playing for them. At underage most lads will play GAA as well. They more than likely go to school and know their GAA team mates well whereas they may play rugby with a couple of their friends/schoolmates. if you force a 10-12 year old to chose between the two there is only going to be one outcome. As things stand, there is very little overlap in the playing seasons of each. Another thing is summer holiday season where underage GAA teams are decimated for about a month

What counties only have 3-4 clubs? Which clubs have teams from7/8 towns playing for them?
Summer rugby wont happen as there isn't a need for it. There is considerable overlap at under 16/minor GAA and rugby grades. Not as much overlap with under 14 gaa and rugby in terms of when games are clashing in where im based and clubs im involved in anyway...

Snickers Man

The issue is a bit bigger than rugby v GAA. Obviously, Ireland couldn't move its rugby season unilaterally. It would have to be done in conjunction with the other countries in Europe.

Obviously, there are major pitfalls at a local level. It would clash horrendously with GAA and, less problematically, with soccer.

I don't think the LoI's move to summer bothered the GAA unduly. They regard domestic Irish soccer with as much disdain as do most Irish soccer fans. Rugby would be a different matter given a) the similarity between the games and b) the raised profile of rugby in recent years. A professional game involving local Irish teams playing against other professional outfits from other countries would be an act of war and the GAA would respond in kind.

There would be vicious competition for sponsors, an end to any "detente" regarding facilities sharing and possibly even the resuscitation of the Ban, albeit in a more subtle fashion.

No sane Irish rugby fan would welcome summer rugby because of the domestic discord it would cause but how would we argue against it if the other European unions, or more likely the powerful English and French clubs pushed for it? How could we convince them that it's a bad idea for them too?

Beery Eyed

I'm all for summer rugby, having played a few seasons of it in Canada & also playing in Oz for a while (which is nearly equivalent of our summers for large parts of the season! ha)

However, as people have mentioned before there are so many other determining factors involved that I have accepted it will probably never happen in Ireland, at least not as a wholesale move.

I do think that we could shift some levels of the game towards the summer months though, and cut out the typically worst months of the year to play.

For instance, it was a lot easier to keep lads involved & energised at club level when training wasn't constantly a battle with the elements & invariably in total darkness. Coming home from training while it's still bright was an unusual, but welcome change while I was playing in Ontario. There were no cancellations for training or matches due to the weather. Instead, we were able to plan beers & bbq's for supporters & players after the games, and even if it rained it wasn't freezing cold & stayed bright late into the evening.

On the pro level I'd also like to see an additional series of games at the start of the summer, when the tours are on, involving the fringe players & academy guys who aren't involved at international or U20 level. It could be a small interpro series of 3 games, but it would provide some good, competitive gametime, in good conditions, for the guys who want to put their hand up for more games next season. It's not quite the Currie Cup or ITM, but it could be a start. When you think about it, the internationals are playing games all year, and then go off to play a summer tour. Whereas a lot of these guys are stuck on the bench, looking for games in the Pro12 & could take the chance to play open, expansive rugby at the end of the year to show that they're good enough to start the following season.